Cumorah Revisited 



or 1 



"The Book of Mormon" 
and the Claims of the Mormons 
Re-examined from the Viewpoint of 
American Archaeology and 
Ethnology 

By 

Charles A. Shook u 



"Everything fundamentally 
Biblical is scientific ; and every- 
thing fundamentally scientific is 
Biblical."— -Joseph Cook. 



THE 



CINCINNATI' 
STANDARD PUBLISHING 
1910 



COMPANY 



Copyright, 1910, 

BY THE 

Standard Publishing Company, 



CCI.A280444 



MORMON HYMN 

Book of Mormon, hid for ages 
On Cumorah's lonely hill, 

Written by those ancient sages 
Whom Jehovah taught his will; 

Glad we hail it, 
Fullness of the gospel still! 

Hail this record, saints in Zion, 
Hidden by Moroni's hand, 

Till the God our souls rely on 
Unto Joseph gave command 

To translate it, 
Send it forth to ev'ry land. 

Hail the glorious light of Nephi, 
Hail the truths that Alma taught; 

We will trust in God like Lehi, 
Seek the Lord as Mormon sought; 

Like Moroni, 
Buy the truth and sell it not. 

Israel, gather round this standard; 

Laman, see thy guiding star; 
Judah, rally round thy banner; 

Come, ye Gentiles from afar; 
Book of Mormon, 

It is truth's triumphal car! 



PREFACE 



Having been taught in childhood to believe that 
the antiquities of America are the work of those accom- 
plished races described in the Book of Mormon, I early 
acquired an interest in the study of American archaeology 
and ethnology that has not abated, but has increased as 
the years have gone by. 

It was while living at Jeffersonville, Indiana, in the 
year 1900, that I conceived the idea of making a special 
study of the Book of Mormon from this viewpoint for 
the purpose of putting out a small pamphlet on the subject. 
As I entered deeper and deeper into the study, the work 
grew until it reached its present proportions, and as dis- 
crepancy after discrepancy between the claims of the 
Book of Mormon and the facts of science were dis- 
covered, I became more and more surprised that this 
ground had not been more thoroughly worked by the 
anti-Mormon polemic before, while I became more and 
more convinced that in the data acquired by archaeolog- 
ical and ethnological research the opponent of this sys- 
tem has a mass of evidence which, if rightly used, will 
completely demolish the claim of the historical credibility 
of the Book of Mormon. 

For the last half century, at least, the Mormons 
have put out works on American archaeology, but most 
of these have been mere collations of passages from 
scientific writers, taken here and there without a con- 
sideration of the context and often so arranged as to 



8 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



give an entirely different impression to the reader than 
their authors sought to convey. My plan has been to 
state fairly the Book of Mormon, or the Mormon, position 
on a certain point, and then to refute it by bringing to 
bear against it the latest and best authority obtainable. 
As the reader will notice, the later writings of Nadail- 
lac, Brinton, Powell, Moorehead, Dellenbaugh, Shaler, 
Thomas, Peet, Henshaw, Holmes and Russell have been 
given precedence over the earlier writings of Adair, 
Boudinot, Priest, Baldwin, Foster and others. American 
archaeology is a growing science, and many of the old 
opinions have had to be given up as research has pro- 
gressed. 

I wish here to acknowledge my indebtedness to the 
authors from whom I quote, and to disclaim any in- 
tention of posing as an authority on American anthro- 
pology. All that I have done, for which I can justly ask 
credit, is to marshal the facts of archaeology, already 
gathered, against the citadel of Mormon error. How 
well this has been done will be for the reader to decide. 

I also wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to Mr. 
Charles Gibson, Mr. Jeff. D. Ward and Mrs. A. E. W. 
Robertson, of Indian Territory, for Indian vocabularies ; 
to Rev. J. S. Howk, of Jeffersonville, Indiana, for lists of 
words in the Hebrew and Chaldee ; to Rev. S. D. Peet, of 
Chicago, Illinois, for valuable suggestions and for in- 
formation touching certain points in which his work as 
an archaeologist has been involved ; and to R. B. Neal, of 
Pikeville, Kentucky, and Prof. R. C. Robbins, of Men- 
dota, Illinois, besides a number of others who have 
rendered valuable help in various ways. 

Charles A. Shook. 

Buchanan, Michigan, August 19, 1908. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



9 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I. 

Page. 

The Rise of Mormonism. Is the Book of Mormon one of 
Solomon Spaulding's romances? — An outline of Book of 
Mormon history — The Book of Mormon and American 
archaeology 15 

CHAPTER II. 

The Origin of Man in America. The antiquity of man in 
America — How man reached America — The native tribes 
and nations of America — The ruins of America — The 
traditional history of America — Archaeological knowl- 
edge in 1830 60 

CHAPTER III. 

Were the Ancient Americans of the White Race? White 
Indians — Traditions of white and bearded men — Red- 
haired mummies — American craniology 139 

CHAPTER IV. 

Are the American Indians of Jewish Descent? History 
of the theory — What the Book of Mormon teaches — An- 
alogies : Division into tribes, worship of Jehovah, notions 
of a theocracy, belief in the administration of angels, 
languages and dialects, manner of reckoning time, 
prophets and priests, festivals, fasts and religious rites, 
ablutions and anointings, separation of women, ab- 
stinence from unclean things, marriage, divorce and pun- 
ishment of adultery, cities of refuge, purifications and 
preparatory ceremonies, ornaments, burial of the dead — 
Madagascaran, Mongolian and Malayan analogies — Facts 
fatal to the theory 173 



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CUMORAH REVISITED 



CHAPTER V. 

Were the Ancient Central Americans and Mexicans the 
Jaredites and Nephites ? What Mormons claim — The 
ancient Central Americans and Mexicans were not white 
— The first people of Central America were savages — 
The first civilized peoples came from the north — The 
contact of the ancient peoples — The first civilized people 
not exterminated — Extent of the ancient empires — Toltec 
history 216 

CHAPTER VI. 



Were the Mound Builders the Jaredites and Nephites? 
History of the discussion on the nationality of the 
Mound Builders — What Mormons believe — The Mound 
Builders one race — The Mound Builders not one nation, 
but many tribes — The- direction of Mound-builder migra- 
tion — The antiquity of the Mound Builders — The culture 
of the Mound Builders — The nationality of the Mound 
Builders 256 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Civilization of Ancient America. The origin of 
ancient American civilization — Did it come from the 
tower of Babel? — Ancient American civilization not de- 
rived from the Jews — Egyptian analogies examined — 
The antiquity of ancient American civilization — Certain 
features of American civilization which oppose the Book 
of Mormon — The ancient Americans did not manu- 
facture iron and steel tools — The ancient Americans did 
not have the horse — The utter absence of wheat and 
other Oriental cereals 3 21 

CHAPTER VIII. 

The Religions of the Americans. The native idea of Go 
— The Mayan trinity — Was Quetzalcoatl Jesus Christ? 
The Indian devil— The American cross — The American 
priesthoods — Rites and ceremonies — Cosmogony — Myth- 
ology — Eschatology — The ancient religions as revealed 
in the ruins and remains — The absence of Jewish and 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



ii 



Christian antiquities — The ancient temples like the 
modern — The presence of idols among the antiquities — 
The etchings and paintings — Altars — Effigy mounds 384 

CHAPTER IX. 

The Native Languages of America. Their supposed re- 
semblance to the Hebrew examined — Their similarity to 
the Chinese and other tongues — Not wrecks, but develop- 
ments — The structure of the American languages — The 
diversity of the American languages — Supposed Book of 
Mormon words in American nomenclature 462 

CHAPTER X. 

The Hieroglyphics of America. No uniform system of 
ancient writing — The character of the Maya hiero- 
glyphics — The origin of the Maya writing — The antiquity 
of the Maya writing — The "Caractors" — The purported 
and genuine statements of Anthon — Are the "Caractors" 
Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic? — Are the 
"Caractors" American? — The "Caractors" deformed 
English — Archaeological frauds — The Grave Creek tablet 
— The Kinderhook plates — The Newark tablet — The 
Davenport tablet — The Mendon plates — Conclusion 502 

APPENDIX. 



The Bogus Relics from Michigan 



567 



CUMORAH REVISITED 13 

ILLUSTRATIONS 



"Hill Cumorah" Frontispiece 

Map of Jaredite Lands 48 

Map of Nephite Lands 53 

Map of Linguistic Stocks of North America 79 

Map of Linguistic Stocks of South America 83 

Cavate Ruins. . 93 

Cliff Dwellings 97 

Map of Nations and Ruins of Central America and Mexico 101 

Casa Colorado. . . •. 105 

Monitor Pipes 312 

Shell Gorget 313 

Ground Plans Maya Temples 339 

Quetzalcoatl Crucified, No. 1 407 

Quetzalcoatl Crucified, No. 2 408 

Mexican Pictographs 505 

Indian Pictographs 510 

Cut of "Caractors" 522 

Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic Characters 528 

Mayan Characters from Palenque 536 

Mayan Characters from Copan 537 

Mayan Characters from Quirigua 538 

Mormon "Caractors" and English Characters 539 

The Grave Creek Tablet 541 

The Kinderhook Plates 547 

The Davenport Tablet 558 

Characters on Bogus Antiquities from Michigan 570 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



CHAPTER I. 

The Rise of Mormonism — Is the Book of Mormon One of 
Spaulding's Romances? — Historical Outline of the Book of 
Mormon — The Book of Mormon and American Archaeology. 

Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, was born 
in Sharon, Windsor County, Vermont, December 23, 
1805. His father's name was Joseph, and his mother's 
maiden name was Lucy Mack. Besides Joseph, there 
were eight other children, as follows: Alvin (who died 
in 1824), Hyrum, Samuel, William, Don Carlos, Sophro- 
nia, Catherine and Lucy. When Joseph was in his tenth 
year the family removed to Ontario (now Wayne) 
County, New York, and settled at Palmyra, four years 
afterwards removing to Manchester, in the same county, 
where he spent his young manhood and where the history 
of Mormonism properly begins. 

In both Palmyra and Manchester the Smiths bore 
an unsavory reputation, and Joseph was reared in igno- 
rance and poverty, and is reputed to have been indolent, 
loose in his habits and of questionable veracity. Dan ford 
Booth, a neighbor, says of him : "I knew Joe Smith 
personally to some extent, saw him frequently, knew 
well his reputation ; he was a lazy, drinking fellow, and 
lcose in his habits in every way." Orrin Reed, another 
neighbor, testifies : "Smith's reputation was bad." And 
William Bryant says of the family: "I knew the Smiths, 



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CUMORAH REVISITED 



but did not associate with them, for they were too low 
to associate with. There was no truth in them. Their 
aim was to get in where they could get property. They 
broke up homes in that way. Smith had no regular busi- 
ness. He had frequent revelations." 1 

Mormon writers try to make it appear that Smith has 
been grossly slandered, but it would seem from his own 
confessions that the charges of his neighbors were not 
far from the truth, for he admits that after receiving hii 
first revelation even he drifted away, "fell into many 
foolish errors, and displayed the weakness of youth and 
the corruption of human nature," which led him "into 
divers temptations, to the gratification of many appetites 
offensive in the sight of God." 2 It is only natural that 
a man should touch his own failings lightly, and it seems 
most likely that his "foolish errors" were his dissolute 
habits mentioned in the testimonies of his neighbors. 

Soon after the Smiths removed to Manchester a 
revival commenced in that place, which, beginning with 
the Methodists, soon became general among the other 
sects of the community — the Baptists and the Presby- 
terians. As a result of strong sectarian prejudices, we 
are told, there was no little contention among the people, 
which considerably disturbed the mind of young Joseph ; 
he being partial to the Methodists, though his mother, his 
brothers, Hyrum and Samuel, and his sister, Sophronia, 
had been proselyted to the Presbyterians. While in this 
state of mind, he tells us, he one day read the words of 
James: "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, 
that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not ; and 
it shall be given him." Taking the apostle's counsel, he 
sought the seclusion of the forest and laid his desires 



1 "Braden and Kelley Debate," p. 119. 

2 "Mr- Durant, of Salt Lake City," p. 71. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



17 



before the Lord in prayer. Scarcely had he begun to 
pray, he says, than he was seized by some unseen power 
which so bound his tongue that he could not speak. 
Thick darkness gathered around him, and it seemed for 
a time that he was doomed to destruction. Terror- 
stricken, he exerted all his powers to call upon the Lord, 
when, to his great joy, a pillar of light, brighter than the 
sun, descended upon him, dispelling the darkness, and his 
power of articulation was restored. At this juncture two 
personages stood before him with a brightness and glory 
beyond description. One of them, pointing to the other, 
said : "This is my beloved Son, hear him." 

"My object in going to inquire of the Lord," says 
Joseph, "was to know which of all the sects was right, 
that I might know which to join. No sooner, therefore, 
did I get possession of myself, so as to be able to 
speak, than I asked the personages who stood above me 
in the light, which of all the sects was right (for at this 
time it had never entered into my heart that all were 
wrong), and which I should join. I was answered that 
I must join none of them, for they were all wrong, and 
the personage who addressed me said that all their creeds 
were an abomination in his sight ; that those professors 
were all corrupt." 

Soon after seeing this vision Joseph related his ex- 
perience to the Methodist preacher, who, he says, treated 
his story with contempt, saying that the whole thing was 
of the devil, and told him that there are no such things 
nowadays, they having ceased with the apostles. 

On the night of the 21st of September, 1823, accord- 
ing to his story, he was favored with another vision. 
After retiring for the night, he betook himself to prayer 
and supplication, when his room was illuminated with a 
heavenly light and a personage appeared before him who 



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CUMORAH REVISITED 



gave his name as Moroni. He said that he Lad come 
from the presence of God, and told Joseph that there was 
a great work for him to do, and that his name should 
go out among the people for both good and evil. He 
informed him that there was a set of plates deposited in 
a hill not far from his home, which contained a history 
of the ancient inhabitants of America, and with them the 
Urim and Thummim by which they were to be translated. 
He also quoted a number of passages from the Bible and 
revealed the depository of the plates "so clearly and dis- 
tinctly," says Joseph, "that I knew the place again when 
I visited it." 

The next day, Smith tells us, he repaired to the spot, 
which was on a hill near Manchester, where he found a 
rock of considerable size, thick in the middle, but thin at 
the edges, which were covered with turf. Removing the 
earth and procuring a lever, he, with some difficulty, 
raised the rock, and found underneath, so his story goes, 
a stone box formed of four flat stones placed upright 
upon another which served as a bottom. The edges of 
these stones, we are told, were firmly held together with 
a certain kind of cement, and the whole formed a box of 
convenient size and so tight as to exclude moisture. This 
box is said to have contained, besides the plates and the 
Urim and Thummim, which were two transparent stones 
set in bows, a breastplate and the sword of Laban, an 
ancient resident of Jerusalem. Joseph made an attempt 
to remove the plates, but was forbidden by the angel, 
who told him that four years must needs elapse before 
they were to be delivered into his hands. 

In October, 1825, Smith hired out to Mr Josiah 
Stoal, a resident of Chenango County, New York, who 
sent him to Harmony, Susquehanna County. Pennsyl- 
vania, to dig for a lost silver mine. While engaged in 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



19 



this labor he boarded at the home of Mr. Isaac Hale, 
where he met his future wife, Mr. Hale's daughter, 
Emma. The Hales were not at all favorable to Joseph's 
suit, on account of his dissolute habits — Joseph says it 
was because he persisted in his claim to have had a 
vision — and he and Emma eloped and were married at the 
house of Squire Tarbill, in South Bambridge, Chenango 
County, New York, January 18, 1827. 

On the 22d of September following, Joseph went, he 
says, for the last time to "Hill Cumorah," where the 
angel delivered the plates into his hands, telling him that 
he would be held responsible for their safekeeping, and 
that if he let them go through carelessness or neglect 
he would be cut off. 

Apostle Parley P. Pratt gives the following descrip- 
tion of the plates and the Urim and Thummim : "These 
records were engraved on plates, which had the appear- 
ance of gold. Each plate was not far from seven by 
eight inches in width and length, being not quite as thick 
as common tin. They were filled on both sides with 
engravings, in Reformed Egyptian characters, and bound 
together in a volume as the leaves of a book, and fas- 
tened at the edge with three rings running through the 
whole. This volume was something near six inches in 
thickness, a part of which was sealed. The characters 
or letters upon the unsealed part were small and beau- 
tifully engraved. The whole book exhibited many marks 
of antiquity in its construction, as well as much skill in 
the art of engraving. With the records was found a 
curious instrument, called by the ancients the Urim and 
Thummim, which consisted of two transparent stones, 
clear as crystal, set in two rims of a bow. This was in 
use in ancient times by persons called seers. It was an 
instrument by the use of which they received revelation 



CUM O RAH REVISITED 



of things distant, or of things past or future.'' — A Voice 
of Warning, p. 73. 

In December, 1827, Smith removed from Manchester, 
where he had been living since his elopement, to the 
home of his father-in-law in Harmony, Pennsylvania, to 
escape, he says, from persecution. It is very possible 
that the citizens of Manchester could have given a better 
reason for his flight. On the way, he declares he was 
detained at two different times by an officer with a 
search-warrant who was looking for the plates. 

In the month of February, 1828, Martin Harris, a 
credulous farmer, who had been a friend to Smith and 
a believer in his story in Palmyra, came to Harmony, 
obtained a transcript of the characters which were on the 
plates, and took them to Xew York and presented them 
to Dr. Mitchell and Professor Anthon, two learned lin- 
guists of that city, for their examination. Harris gives 
the following account of what happened at Xew York: 

"I went to the city of Xew York and presented the 
characters which had been translated, with the transla- 
tion thereof, to Professor Anthon, a gentleman celebrated 
for his literary attainments. Professor Anthon stated 
that the translation was correct, more so than any he had 
before seen translated from the Egyptian. I then showed 
him those which were not yet translated, and he said that 
they were Egyptian. Chaldaic, Assyriac and Arabic, and 
he said that they were the true characters. He gave me 
a certificate certifying to the people of Palmyra that they 
were true characters, and that the translation of such of 
them as had been translated was also correct. I took the 
certificate and put it into my pocket, and was just leaving 
the house, when Mr. Anthon called me back, and asked 
me how the young man found out that there were gold 
plates in the place where he found them. I answered 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



21 



that an angel of God had revealed it unto him. He then 
said unto me, 'Let me see that certificate.' I accordingly 
took it out of my pocket and gave it to him, when he 
took it and tore it to pieces, saying that there was no 
such thing now as the ministering of angels, and that if 
I would bring the plates to him he would translate them. 
I informed him that part of the plates were sealed, and 
that I was forbidden to bring them. He replied, 'I can 
not read a sealed book.' I left him and went to Dr. 
Mitchell, who sanctioned what Professor Anthon had 
said respecting both the characters and the transla- 
tion." 

Upon returning from New York, Harris became 
Smith's scribe, and, after copying 116 pages, the Book 
of Lehi, he secured Smith's permission to carry the 
manuscript home with him to read to his wife, who did 
not prove as credulous as Martin. One evening, after 
reading the story to Mrs. Harris and some "pious 
friends," he locked the manuscript in a bureau drawer 
and also locked the door of the room. But, notwith- 
standing these precautions, on the morrow it was gone. 
It seems that Mrs. Harris did not approve of her hus- 
band's course, and, obtaining the manuscript, consigned 
it to the flames. Great was Smith's consternation when 
he learned of the misfortune. He, supposing that the 
manuscript had been preserved, was fearful lest, if he 
should write another Book of Lehi. the first would be 
produced, compared with the second, and the fraud be 
detected. On the other hand, if this part of the book 
were not reproduced, it would be a tacit confession of 
the imposture. At this critical time Joseph received 
another revelation in which he was told that the words 
of the manuscript had been altered so that they would 
read contrary to what had been written, for which cause 



CVMORAH REVISITED 



he was commanded not to translate that portion of the 
plates again so that his enemies might "not accomplish 
their evil designs in lying against those words." For his 
carelessness Harris lost his place as Smith's scribe, and 
was severely reprimanded by the Lord in a revelation to 
Joseph. 

For several months the work of translating was inter- 
rupted, until the 17th of April, 1829, when Oliver Cow- 
dery, who had been a schoolteacher in the Smith district 
in Xew York, and who had heard of Joseph's claims 
from his father, and who had arrived two days before, 
began his services as Smith's scribe. 

The manner of translating was unique. Smith, so 
David Whitmer says, sat at one end of a table and 
Cowdery at the other. The plates were not directly be- 
fore Joseph, but. with the Urim and Thummim in his 
hat and his hat over his face, he read off the stones the 
translation of the original characters to Cowdery, who 
wrote it down as it fell from his lips. And, we are 
informed, neither the characters nor the translation, both 
of which appeared on the Urim and Thummim, dis- 
appeared until after Cowdery had written the translation 
down correctly. 1 

On May 15, 1829, John the Baptist appeared and 
ordained Smith and Cowdery, so they claim, to the 
Aaronic priesthood ; following which Joseph baptized 
Oliver, then Oliver Joseph, upon which they reordained 
each other to the same office to which they had been set 
apart by the spirit hands of the Baptist. 

The Book of Mormon was finally translated, copy- 
righted June 11, 1829, and issued in book form early in 
1830. With it appeared the testimony of three witnesses, 



1 "Prophet of Palmyra," p. 26. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



23 



Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer and Martin Harris ; 
and also the testimony of eight witnesses, Christian 
Whitmer, Jacob Whitmer, Peter Whitmer, Jr., John 
Whitmer, Hiram Page, Joseph Smith, Sr., Hyrum Smith 
and Samuel H. Smith. 

THE TESTIMONY OF THREE WITNESSES. 

Be it known unto all nations, kindreds, tongues, and 
people, unto whom this work shall come, that we, through 
the grace of God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, 
have seen the plates which contain this record, which is a 
record of the people of Nephi, and also of the Lamanites, 
their brethren, and also of the people of Jared, who came 
from the tower of which hath been spoken; and we also 
know that they have been translated by the gift and 
power of God, for his voice hath declared it unto us ; 
wherefore we know of a surety that the work is true. 
And we also testify that we have seen the engravings 
which are upon the plates ; and they have been shown 
unto us by the power of God, and not of man. And we 
declare with words of soberness, that an angel of God 
came down from heaven, and he brought and laid before 
our eyes, that we beheld and saw the plates, and the 
engravings thereon ; and we know that it is by the grace 
of God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, that we 
beheld and bare record that these things are true ; and it 
is marvelous in our eyes ; nevertheless, the voice of the 
Lord commanded us that we should bear record of it ; 
wherefore, to be obedient unto the commandments of 
God, we bear testimony of these things. And we know 
that if we are faithful in Christ, we shall rid our gar- 
ments of the blood of all men, and be found spotless 
before the judgment seat of Christ, and shall dwell with 
him eternally in the heavens. And the honor be to the 



24 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, which is 
one God. Amen. Oliver Cowdery, 

David Whitmer, 
Martin Harris. 

the testimony of eight witnesses. 

Be it known unto all nations, kindreds, tongues, and 
people, unto whom this work shall come, that Joseph 
Smith, Jr., the translator of this work, has shown unto 
us the plates of which hath been spoken, which have the 
appearance of gold ; and as many of the leaves as said 
Smith has translated, we did handle with our hands ; and 
we also saw the engravings thereon, all of which has the 
appearance of ancient work, and of curious workman- 
ship. And this we bear record with words of soberness, 
that the said Smith has shown unto us, for we have seen 
and hefted, and know of a surety, that the said Smith 
has got the plates of which we have spoken. And we 
give our names unto the world to witness unto the world 
that which we have seen ; and we lie not, God bearing 
witness of it. 



Christian Whitmer, 
Jacob Whitmer, 
Peter Whitmer, Jr., 
John Whitmer, 



Hiram Page, 
Joseph Smith, Sr., 
Hyrum Smith, 
Samuel H. Smith. 



On April 6, 1830, the Church of Jesus Christ of 
Latter-day Saints was organized at Fayette, Seneca 
County, New York, with six members : Joseph Smith, 
Aliver Cowdery, Samuel Smith, Hyrum Smith, David 
Whitmer and Peter Whitmer. Of these, Joseph Smith 
and Oliver Cowdery were called and ordained elders. 
This, in brief, is the history of the rise of Mormonism, 
chiefly from the Mormon viewpoint. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



25 



IS THE BOOK OF MORMON ONE OF SPAULDING's ROMANCES? 

Gentiles, with few exceptions, 1 believe that the Book 
of Mormon is one of Solomon Spaulding's romances, 
which somehow fell into Smith's hands and was altered 
to suit his purpose. No matter what others may think, 
I agree with those who are of this opinion, although I 
have not always done so. 2 

Solomon Spaulding was born at Ashford, Connecti- 
cut, in 1 76 1 ; graduated from Dartmouth College in 1785, 
and completed his course in theology in 1787. After this 
he preached for a time, but finally became an infidel, quit 
preaching and engaged in merchandizing in Cherry Val- 
ley, New York, where he failed financially in 1807. In 
1809, with a business partner, Henry Lake, he built a 
forge at Conneaut, Ohio, where he again failed in 18 12. 
The same year he removed to Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, 
in which city he lived for two years, removing then to 
the town of Amity, in the same State, where he died 
in 1816. 

It was while living at Conneaut that he became inter- 
ested in the aboriginal works of the country, and began 
his career as a writer of romances based upon them. 

His first story proves to be a fictitious history of a 
company of Romans who, in a voyage to Britain in the 
time of Constantine, were driven from their course by 
contrary winds and were carried to our shores. They 

1 D. H. Bays, for years a prominent minister in the Josephite Church, 
says, in his "Doctrines and Dogmas of Mormonism," p. 25: "The entire 
theory connecting Sidney Rigdon and the Spaulding romance with Joseph 
Smith in originating the Book of Mormon must be abandoned." He 
connects Oliver Cowdery with Joseph in the fraud. 

2 I refer the reader to the excellent little work, "The Origin of the 
'Book of Mormon,' Re-examined in Its Relation to Spaulding's 'Manu- 
script Found'," by A. T. Schroeder, for sale at the Utah Gospel Mission, 
739 Republic St., Cleveland, O., for a thorough discussion of this question 
from the anti-Mormon viewpoint. 



26 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



found their way inland, and one of them wrote a history 
of two Indian tribes, the Sciotans and Kentucks, who 
were said to have lived on the Ohio River. Spaulding 
pretended to have found this history, written in the Latin 
language on twenty-eight rolls of parchment, in a stone 
box in a cave on Conneaut Creek. It is evident that this 
story was never finished, for it ends abruptly. Spaulding 
gave as his reason for throwing it aside that he wished 
to go further back in his dates and write in the old 
Scriptural style, that his story might appear more ancient. 
In 1834 this manuscript was loaned by Spaulding's widow 
to one Dr. D. P. Hurlburt, who was then gathering 
evidence against the Mormons, and was turned over by 
him to a Mr. E. D. Howe, editor of the Painesville 
(O.) Telegraph, who was writing a book, "Mormon- 
ism Unveiled." Howe subsequently sold out to one L. 
L. Rice, who started an antislavery newspaper, and 
among other things transferred to him this manuscript 
of Spaulding's. The Spaulding family, losing track of 
the manuscript, charged Hurlburt with having sold it to 
the Mormons, but this was subsequently proved untrue, 
for Mr. Rice, who in the meantime had removed to 
Honolulu, Sandwich Islands, discovered it among old 
papers in his possession in 1884, and afterwards depos- 
ited it in the library of Oberlin College, where it still 
remains. Both of the Mormon churches have published 
copies of this manuscript, and insist that it forever settles 
the question of the Book of Mormon originating in the 
writings of Solomon Spaulding. 1 

1 Mormon writers and speakers try to make it appear that this is the 
only manuscript that Spaulding ever wrote. The Deseret News for July 19, 
1900, says: "The discovery of the manuscript written by Mr. Spaulding, 
and its deposit in the library at Oberlin College, O., . . . has so com- 
pletely demolished the theory once relied upon by superficial minds that 
the 'Book of Mormon' was concocted from that manuscript, that it has 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



27 



But that Spaulding wrote at least one other romance, 
the historical outline of which was identical, or nearly so, 
with the historical outline of the Book of Mormon, is 
proved by the testimonies of a number of his relatives 
and acquaintances, to whom he was in the habit of 
reading his stories. This manuscript was placed in the, 
printing establishment of one Robert Patterson, of Pitts- 
burg, for publication, from which it mysteriously dis- 
appeared, and everything points to its having been stolen 
by Sidney Rigdon, who afterwards figured conspicuously 
as Smith's first counselor, and who at that time was an 
intimate acquaintance of one of Patterson's employes, 
J. Harrison Lambdin. 

Patterson was in the book business in 1812 in the 
firm of Patterson & Hopkins. In January, 1818, the 
partnership of Patterson & Lambdin was formed, suc- 
ceeding the firm of R. & J. Patterson. The firm of 
Patterson & Lambdin continued until 1823. In 18 12 
Spaulding borrowed money and removed to Pittsburg 
for the purpose of having his story published, thus 
making it possible for him to pay his debts. His widow 
declares that the manuscript was returned to him with 
the advice to "polish it up, finish it, and you will make 
money out of it." The Spauldings then removed to 

been entirely abandoned by all opponents of Mormonism except the 
densely ignorant or unscrupulously dishonest." But no anti-Mormon 
writer has ever claimed, but all have expressly denied, that the "Book of 
Mormon" originated in Spaulding's Roman story. As early as 1834 Howe 
gave a good outline of that story and declared that the "Book of Mormon" 
originated in another, and this has been maintained all along. Yet, not- 
withstanding this, the ministry of the Mormon Church appear before the 
public with the claim that Spaulding wrote a manuscript; that it has 
been asserted that this manuscript was stolen from Patterson's printing- 
office and was worked over into the "Book of Mormon;" that this manu- 
script has been found; and that it bears no resemblance whatever to the 
"Book of Mormon." The "densely ignorant" and "unscrupulously dis- 
honest" are those who make this false claim in the face of the well- 
established facts. 



28 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Amity, where they kept a tavern, and where the story, as 
at Conneaut. became a great attraction. Here Spaulding 
evidently polished it up, finished it. and resubmitted it 
for publication sometime before his death in 1816. Mrs. 
Spaulding, who makes no mention of a resubmission, and 
who thinks that Rigdon copied the manuscript when it 
was first in Patterson's office, does, however, state that 
Patterson did at one time tell him to "make out a title- 
page and preface." It seems most likely that such advice 
would be given after the story had been finished and 
resubmitted for publication. It is possible that Spauld- 
ing. in polishing and finishing his story, rewrote it, and 
that it was the story rewritten which was resubmitted to 
Patterson and which fell into Rigdon's hands : while the 
old manuscript may have been placed in a trunk, with 
other papers of Spaulding's. which was sent, after his 
death, to the home of his wife's brother, W. H. Sabine, 
in Onondaga County. Xew York. Smith worked as a 
teamster for Sabine in 1823. and some have claimed that 
he either copied or stole this manuscript. The first is 
very unreasonable, the second is possible, if such a manu- 
script was in Sabine's possession. 

That one of Spaulding's manuscripts was stolen from 
Patterson's office, and that Spaulding suspected Rigdon 
of the theft, is evident from what Spaulding said to an 
intimate acquaintance, Joseph Miller, a short time before 
his death. Miller testifies : "My recollection is that 
Spaulding left a transcript of the manuscript with Pat- 
terson for publication. The publication was delayed until 
Spaulding could write a preface. In the meantime the 
manuscript was spirited away, and could not be found. 
Spaulding told me that Sidney Rigdon had taken it, or 
was suspected of taking it. I recollect distinctly that 
Rigdon's name was mentioned in connection with it," 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



29 



Mr. Miller was an intimate friend of Spaulding, bailed 
him out of jail when he was imprisoned for debt, made 
his coffin for him and helped bury him when dead. He 
resided at Amity. 

That this conviction was shared in by others is shown 
by what his attending physician, Cephus Dodd, M. D., 
told George M. French at Spaulding's grave in 1832, two 
years before it was publicly charged that Spaulding's 
story was the basis of the Book of Mormon. He ex- 
pressed a strong conviction that the Book of Mormon 
originated in the Spaulding manuscript, and that Rigdon 
was the one who transformed the former into the latter. 

But Mormons insist that Rigdon was not a resident 
of Pittsburg at the time it is claimed Spaulding had busi- 
ness relations with Patterson, and so could not have been 
the thief even if such a manuscript had been stolen from 
the establishment of Patterson. But this claim is con- 
tradicted by the evidences. Rigdon was born February 
19, 1793, at Piney Fork, Allegheny County, Pennsyl- 
vania. The place of his birth is variously estimated at. 
from six to twelve miles from Pittsburg. He lived on 
the farm with his parents up to the time of his father's 
death in 1810, and after that until his twenty-sixth year, 
or till 1819. He united with the Baptist Church at Piney 
Fork, May 31, 1817, and was licensed to preach in 
March, 18 19. The following year he was ordained a 
Baptist preacher, and was married to Phoebe Brooks, a 
sister of the wife of Adamson Bently, then a Baptist 
minister, but afterwards prominently connected with the 
movement of the Campbells. In 182 1, in November, 
Rigdon received a call from the Baptist Church of Pitts- 
burg, and began active duties in February, 1822. On 
October 11, 1823, he was excluded for heresy, and sub- 
sequently, with the assistance of Alexander Campbell 



30 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



and Walter Scott, organized a Disciple church, of which 
he became pastor. He continued to preach for the Dis- 
ciples up to the time that he became a Mormon in 
November, 1830. 

Living for twenty-six years but a few miles from 
Pittsburg, which was the largest city and chief trading- 
point in that part of the country, it will hardly be denied 
that he was occasionally there before he became pastor of 
the Baptist Church in 1822. That he was at least a fre- 
quent visitor to that city and a friend of young Lambdin 
during the time in which Spaulding's relations with Pat- 
terson existed, is proved by the testimony of Mrs. R. J. 
Eichbaum, given at Pittsburg, September 18, 1879. 

"My father, John Johnson, was postmaster at Pitts- 
burg for about eighteen years, from 1804 to 1822. My 
husband, William Eichbaum, succeeded him, and was 
postmaster for about eleven years, from 1822. to 1833. 
I was born August 25, 1792, and when I became old 
enough I assisted my father in attending to the post- 
office, and became familiar with his duties. From 181 1 
to 1816 I was the regular clerk in the office, assorting, 
making up, dispatching, opening and distributing the 
mails. Pittsburg was then a small town, and I was well 
acquainted with all the stated visitors at the office who 
called regularly for their mails. So meager at that time 
were the mails that I could generally tell without looking 
whether or not there was anything for such persons, 
though I would usually look in order to satisfy them. I 
was married in 181 5, and the next year my connection 
with the office ceased, except during the absences of my 
husband. I knew and distinctly remember Robert and 
Joseph Patterson, J. Harrison Lambdin, Silas Engles 
and Sidney Rigdon. I remember Rev. Air. Spaulding, 
but simply as one who occasionally called to inquire for 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



31 



letters. I remember there was an evident intimacy be- 
tween Lambdin and Rigdon. They very often came to 
the office together. I particularly remember that they 
would thus come during the hour on Sabbath afternoon 
when the office was required to be open, and I remember 
feeling sure that Rev. Mr. Patterson knew nothing of 
this, or he would have put a stop to it. I do not know 
what position, if any, Rigdon filled in Patterson's store 
or printing-office, but am well assured he was frequently, 
if not constantly, there for a large part of the time when 
I was clerk in the post-office. I recall Mr. Engles saying 
that 'Rigdon was always hanging around the printing- 
office.' He was connected with the tannery before he 
became a preacher, though he may have continued the 
business whilst preaching." 

This testimony is important, as it establishes the 
whereabouts of Rigdon during those years in which 
Spaulding's relations with Patterson existed, and also 
the facts that Rigdon was an intimate acquaintance of 
young Lambdin and had the opportunity of possessing 
himself of the manuscript, being a frequent lounger 
around the printing-office. 

That Rigdon afterwards had a manuscript in his pos- 
session which he was fond of reading, and which he at 
one time at least declared was that cf Spaulding's, is 
proved by the testimonies of Rev. John Winter and 
Mrs. Amos Dunlap. Dr. Winter was a pioneer preacher 
in western Pennsylvania, and at the time that Rigdon 
was pastor of the Baptist Church of Pittsburg was -a 
schoolteacher in that city. Mrs. Dunlap was a niece of 
Mrs. Rigdon. 

The testimony of Dr. Winter is as follows: "In 1822 
or 1823 Rigdon took out of his desk in his study a large 
manuscript, stating that it was a Bible romance purport- 



32 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



ing to be a history of the American Indians. That it was 
written by one Spaulding, a Presbyterian preacher, whose 
health had failed and who had taken it to the printers 
to see if it would pay to publish it. And that he had 
borrowed it from the printer as a curiosity." 

On the 7th of December, 1879, Mrs. Dunlap made 
the following statement: "When I was quite a child I 
visited Mr. Rigdon's family. He married my aunt. They 
at that time" — in 1826-7 — "lived at Bainbridge, Ohio. 
During my visit Mr. Rigdon went to his bedroom and 
took from a trunk, which he kept locked, a certain manu- 
script. He came out into the other room and seated him- 
self by the fireplace and commenced reading it. His wife 
at that moment came into the room and exclaimed: 
'What ! you are studying that thing again ?' or something 
to that effect. She then added: T mean to burn that 
paper.' He said: 'No, indeed, you will not; this will be 
a great thing some day.' Whenever he was reading this 
he was so completely occupied that he seemed entirely 
unconscious of anything passing around him." 

That Rigdon foreknew of the coming out of the Book 
of Mormon at least two years before it appeared, is 
proved by the statements which he made to his brother- 
in-law, Adamson Bently, and to Alexander Campbell. 

In a letter to Walter Scott, dated January 22, 1841, 
Bently said: "I know that Sidney Rigdon told me that 
there was a book coming out, the manuscript of which 
had been found engraved on gold plates, as much as two 
years before the Mormon book made its appearance or 
had been heard of by me." 

This statement appeared in the disciple organ, the 
Millennial Harbinger, in 1844, and was commented upon 
by the editor, Alexander Campbell, as follows : "The con- 
versation alluded to in Brother Bently's letter of 1841 



CUMORJH REVISITED 



33 



was in my presence as well as his, and my recollection 
of it led me, some two or three years ago, to interrogate 
Brother Bently touching his recollection of it, which 
accorded with mine in every particular, except the year 
in which it occurred, he placing it in the summer of 1827, 
I in the summer of 1826, Rigdon at the same time 
observing that in the plates dug up in New York there 
was an account, not only of the aborigines of this coun- 
try, but also it was stated that the Christian religion 
had been preached in this country during the first 
century, just as we were preaching it in the Western 
Reserve." 

Alexander Campbell is a witness who needs not to be 
vouched for, and his testimony in this matter can not fail 
to carry weight. The testimonies of Bently and Camp- 
bell prove that Rigdon knew of Smith and the Book of 
Mormon as early, at least, as the year 1827, in September 
of which the latter claimed to take the plates from their 
depository; though Rigdon himself denies that he ever 
saw the Book of Mormon until in the fall of 1830. 

We have other witnesses who testify that Rigdon told 
them of the coming out of a book describing the ancient 
Americans some time before he became a Mormon. 

Darwin Atwater made the following statement at 
Mantua Station, Ohio, April 26, 1873: "Soon after this 
the great Mormon defection came on us (disciples). 
Sidney Rigdon preached for us, and, notwithstanding his 
extravagantly wild freaks, he was held in high repute 
by many. For a few months before his professed con- 
version to Mormonism, it was noticed that his wild, 
extravagant propensities had been more marked. That 
he knew before of the coming of the Book of Mormon 
is to me certain from what he said during the first of his 
visits to my father's some years before. He gave a 



34 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



wonderful description of the mounds and other antiqui- 
ties found in some parts of America, and said that they 
must have been made by the aborigines. He said that 
there was a book to be published containing an account 
of those things. He spoke of these in his eloquent, 
enthusiastic style as being a thing most extraordinary." 

And on June 3, 1841, Dr. S. Rosa, at Painesville, 
Ohio, testified as follows : ''In the early part of the year 
1830, when the Book of Mormon appeared, either in 
May or June, I was in company with Sidney Rigdon, and 
rode with him on horseback a few miles. Our conver- 
sation was principally upon the subject of religion, as he 
was at that time a very popular preacher of the denomi- 
nation calling themselves disciples, or 'Campbellites/ 
He remarked to me that it was time for a new religion 
to spring up ; that mankind were all rife and ready for 
it. I thought he alluded to the Campbelhte doctrine. He 
said it would not be long before something would make 
its appearance; he also said that he thought of leaving 
Pennsylvania, and should be absent for some months. I 
asked him how long. He said it would depend upon 
circumstances. I began to think a little strange of his 
remarks, as he was a minister of the gospel. I left Ohio 
that fall and went to the State of New York to visit my 
friends who lived in Waterloo, not far from the mine of 
golden Bibles. In November I was informed that my 
old neighbor, E. Partridge, and the Rev. Sidney Rigdon 
were in Waterloo, and that they both had become the 
dupes of Joe Smith's necromancies. It then occurred to 
me that Rigdon's new religion had made its appearance, 
and when I became informed of the Spauldmg manu- 
script, I was confirmed m the opinion that Rigdon was 
at least accessory, if not the principal, m getting up this 
farce." 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



35 



It now remains to be shown that Rigdon and Smith 
knew of each other, and that Rigdon had the opportunity 
to get the manuscript into Smith's hands in time for its 
transformation into the Book of Mormon. This, of 
course, is stoutly denied by the Mormons, who contend 
that Rigdon knew nothing of either Smith or his book 
before the visit of Parley P. Pratt to Kirtland, Ohio, 
where Rigdon resided, in November, 1830. The claim 
is made that at first Sidney opposed the new religion, but 
was converted by a vision and was baptized November 
14, 1830. 

An intimate acquaintance of Rigdon, Zebulon Ru- 
dolph, a disciple minister and father-in-law of President 
Garfield, testifies as to his mysterious actions during the 
winter prior to the appearance of the Book of Mormon. 
"During the winter previous to the appearance of the 
Book of Mormon, Rigdon was in the habit of spending 
weeks away from home, going no one knew whither. 
He often appeared preoccupied, and he would indulge in 
dreamy, visionary talks, which puzzled those who lis- 
tened. When the Book of Mormon appeared and Rigdon 
joined in the advocacy of the new religion, the suspicion 
was at once aroused that he was one of the framers of 
the new doctrine, and that probably he was not ignorant 
of the authorship of the Book of Mormon." 

That for two years before he became a Mormon he 
was occasionally a visitor at Smith's home, is proved by 
the statements of Smith's neighbors. 

Pomeroy Tucker, who knew the Smiths well and who 
helped read the proofs of the Book of Mormon, testifies : 
"A mysterious stranger now appears at Smith's and 
holds intercourse with the famed money-digger. For a 
considerable time no intimation of the name or purpose 
of this stranger transpired to the public, not even to 



36 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Smith's nearest neighbors. It was observed by some that 
his visits were frequently repeated. The sequel of the 
intimacies of this stranger and the money-digger will 
sufficiently appear hereafter. There was great conster- 
nation when the 118 pages of manuscript were stolen 
from Harris, for it seems to have been impossible, for 
some unaccountable reason, to retranslate the stolen por- 
tion. The reappearance of this mysterious stranger at 
Smith's at this juncture was again the subject of inquiry 
and conjecture by observers, from whom was withheld 
all explanations of his identity and purpose. When the 
Book of Mormon appeared Rigdon was an early convert. 
Up to this time he had played his part in the background, 
and his occasional visits to Smith's had been observed by 
the inhabitants as those of the mysterious stranger. It 
had been his policy to remain in concealment until all 
things were in readiness for blowing the trumpet of the 
new gospel. He now came to the front as the first regu- 
lar preacher in Palmyra." 

On May 2, 1879, Abel D. Chase, another neighbor of 
the Smiths, signed a statement in the presence of Pliny 
T. Sexton, village president of Palmyra, and J. H. Gil- 
bert, who set up the first edition of the Book of Mor- 
mon, relative to the visits of Rigdon to Palmyra before 
1830. Of this statement the following is an extract: 
"During some of my visits at the Smiths, I saw a 
stranger there who they said was Mr. Rigdon. He was 
at Smith's several times, and it was in the year of 1827 
when I first saw him there, as near as I can recollect. 
Some time after that tales were circulated that young 
Joe had found or dug from the earth a book of plates 
which the Smiths called the Golden Bible." 

On October 14, 1879, Mr. Gilbert, mentioned above, 
wrote to Mr. James T. Cobb, of Salt Lake City, Utah, 



CUMORAII REVISITED 



37 



as follows : "Last evening I had about fifteen minutes' 
conversation with Mr. Lorenzo Saunders, of Reading, 
Hillsdale County, Michigan. He has been gone about 
thirty years. He was born south of our village in 1811, 
and was a near neighbor of the Smith family — knew 
them all well; was in the habit of visiting the Smith 
boys ; says he knows that Rigdon was hanging around 
Smith's for eighteen months prior to the publishing of 
the Mormon Bible." 

This chain of evidence seems quite conclusive in prov- 
ing the origin of the Book of Mormon in one of the 
manuscripts of Solomon Spaulding. But the most im- 
portant and positive evidence that we have that the Book 
of Mormon originated as claimed, are the statements of 
a number of Spaulding's relatives and acquaintances to 
whom he was in the habit of reading his writings. These 
witnesses establish, beyond a doubt, that one of his stories 
was similar in historical outline to the Book of Mormon, 
and that it also contained names found in the latter, such 
as Lehi, Nephi, Lamanites, Nephites, Laban, Moroni, 
Amlicites and Zarahemla. 

In 1832 or 1833, a Mormon preacher came to Con- 
neaut, the old home of Spaulding, and read a number of 
extracts from the Book of Mormon before a congrega- 
tion composed, in part, of his relatives and acquaintances. 
The historical part was immediately recognized by his 
brother, John Spaulding, and others. The excitement 
was so intense that a citizens' meeting was called and Dr. 
Philastrus Hurlburt was chosen to collect the evidence 
which afterwards appeared in Howe's "Mormonism Un- 
veiled." This evidence is composed, in part, of the state- 
ments of those who heard Spaulding's manuscript read, 
relative to its similarity to the Book of Mormon in certain 
names and in general historical outline. The Mormons 



38 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



have never succeeded in overthrowing these testimonies, 
and they stand to-day as "the most important single col- 
lection of original evidence ever made upon the subject." 1 

John Spaulding says of his brother's manuscript: 
"The book he was writing was entitled 'Manuscript 
Found,' of which he read to me many passages. It was 
an historical romance of the first settlers of America, 
endeavoring to show that the American Indians are the 
descendants of the Jew, or the lost tribes. It gave a 
detailed account of their journey from Jerusalem by land 
and sea till they arrived in America under the command 
of Nephi and Lehi. They afterwards had quarrels and 
contentions and separated into two distinct nations, one 
of which he denominated Nephites and the other Laman- 
ites. Cruel and bloody wars ensued, in which great 
multitudes were slain. They buried their dead in large 
heaps, which caused the mounds so common in this 
country. The arts, sciences and civilization were brought 
into view in order to account for all the curious antiqui- 
ties found in various parts of North and South America. 
I have recently read the Book of Mormon, and, to my 
great surprise, I find nearly all the same historical matter, 
names, etc., as they were in my brother's writings. I 
well remember that he wrote in the old style and com- 
menced about every sentence with 'And it came to pass,' 
or, 'Now it came to pass,' the same as in the Book of 
Mormon, and, according to my best recollection and be- 
lief, it is the same as my brother Solomon wrote, with 
the exception of the religious matter. By what means it 
has fallen into the hands of Joseph Smith, Jr., I am 
unable to determine." 

Martha Spaulding, the wife of John Spaulding, tes- 



"The Origin of the Book of Mormon, Re-examined," etc., p. 40. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



39 



tifies : "I was personally acquainted with Solomon Spauld- 
ing about twenty years ago. I was at his house a short 
time before he left Conneaut; he was then writing a 
historical novel, founded upon the first settlers of Amer- 
ica. He represented them as an enlightened and war- 
like people. He had for many years contended that the 
aborigines of America were the descendants of some of 
the lost tribes of Israel, and this idea he carried out in 
the book in question. The lapse of time which has inter- 
vened prevents my recollecting but few of the leading 
incidents of his writings ; but the names of Nephi and 
Lehi are yet fresh in my memory as being the principal 
heroes of his tale. They were the officers of the com- 
pany which first came off from Jerusalem. He gave a 
peculiar account of their journey by land and sea till they 
arrived in America, after which disputes arose between 
the chiefs which caused them to separate into different 
bands, one of which was called Lamanites and the other 
Nephites. Between these were recounted tremendous 
battles, which frequently covered the ground with the 
slain ; and their being buried in large heaps was the cause 
of the numerous mounds in the country. Some of these 
people he represented as being very large. I have read 
the Book of Mormon, which has brought fresh to my 
recollection the writings of Solomon Spaulding, and I 
have no manner of doubt that the historical part of it is 
the same that I read and heard read more than twenty 
years ago. The old, obsolete style and the phrases of 
'and it came to pass,' etc., are the same." 

Henry Lake, Spaulding's business partner, testifies: 
"He very frequently read to me from a manuscript which 
he was writing, which he entitled the 'Manuscript Found/ 
and which he represented as being found in this town. I 
spent many hours in hearing him read said writings, and 



40 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



became well acquainted with its contents. He wished me 
to assist him in getting his production printed, alleging 
that a book of that kind would meet with a rapid 
sale. I designed doing so, but the forge not meeting 
cur anticipations, we failed in business, when I de- 
clined having anything to do with the publication of 
the book. This book represented the American In- 
dians as the descendants of the lost tribes, gave an 
account of their leaving Jerusalem, their contentions 
and wars, which were many and great. One time, 
when he was reading to me the tragic account of 
Laban, I pointed out to him what I considered an in- 
consistency, which he promised to correct, but b}^ re- 
ferring to the Book of Mormon, I find, to my surprise, 
that it stands there just as he read it to me then. Some 
months ago I borrowed the Golden Bible, put it into my 
pocket, carried it home and thought no more about it. 
About a week after my wife found the book in my coat 
pocket as it hung up, and commenced reading it aloud 
as I lay upon the bed. She had not read twenty minutes 
when I was astonished to find the same passages in it 
that Spaulding had read to me more than twenty years 
before from his 'Manuscript Found.' Since that I have 
more carefully examined the said Golden Bible, and have 
no hesitation in saying that the historical part of it is 
principally, if not wholly, taken from the 'Manuscript 
Found.' I well recollect telling Mr. Spaulding that the 
so frequent use of the words, 'And it came to pass,' 'Now 
it came to pass,' rendered it ridiculous." 

John N. Miller, who worked for Spaulding and Lake 
at Conneaut, and who boarded with the iormer, testifies : 
"He had written two or three books or pamphlets on dif- 
ferent subjects, but that which more particularly drew 
my attention was the one which he called the 'Manuscript 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



41 



Found/ From this he would frequently read some 
humorous passages to the company present. It pur- 
ported to be the history of the first settlement of America 
before discovered by Columbus. He brought them off 
from Jerusalem under their leaders, detailing their travels 
by land and water, their manners, customs, laws, wars, 
etc. He said that he designed it as a historical novel, and 
that in after years it would be believed by many people as 
much as the history of England. He soon after failed 
in business, and told me that he should retire from the 
din of his creditors, finish his book and have it published, 
which would enable him to pay his debts and support his 
family. He soon after removed to Pittsburg, as I under- 
stood. I have recently examined the Book of Mormon, 
and find in it the writings of Solomon Spaulding from 
beginning to end, but mixed up with Scripture and other 
religious matters which I did not meet with in the 'Manu- 
script Found.' Many of the passages in the Mormon 
book are verbatim from Spaulding, and others in part. 
The names of Nephi, Lehi, Moroni, and, in fact, all the 
principal names, are brought fresh to my recollection by 
the Golden Dible. When Spaulding divested his history 
of its fabulous names by a verbal explanation, he landed 
his people near the Straits of Darien, which I am very 
confident he called Zarahemla ; they were marched about 
that country for a length of time in which wars and 
great bloodshed ensued. He brought them across North 
America in a northeast direction." 

Aaron Wright testifies : "I first became acquainted 
with Solomon Spaulding in 1808 or 1809, when he com- 
menced building a forge on Conneaut Creek. When at 
his house one day, he showed and read to me a history 
he was writing of the lost tribes of Israel, purporting 
that they were the first settlers of America, and that the 



42 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Indians were their descendants. Upon this subject we 
had frequent conversations. He traced their journey 
from Jerusalem to America as it is given in the Book of 
Mormon, excepting the religious matter. The historical 
part of the Book of Mormon I know to be the same as I 
read and heard read from the writings of Spaulding more 
than twenty years ago ; the names are especially the same, 
without any alteration. He told me his object was to 
account for all the fortifications, etc., to be found in this 
country, and said that in time it would be fully believed 
by all except learned men and historians. I once antici- 
pated reading his writings in print, but little expected 
to see them in a new Bible. Spaulding had many other 
manuscripts which I expect to see when Smith translates 
his other plate. In conclusion I will observe that the 
names of, and most of the historical part of, the Book of 
Mormon were as familiar to me before I read it as most 
modern history. If it is not Spaulding's writing, it is 
the same as he wrote ; and if Smith was inspired, I think 
it was by the same spirit that Spaulding was, which he 
confessed to be the love of money." 

Oliver Smith testifies : "When Solomon Spaulding 
first came to this place (Conneaut), he purchased a tract 
of land, surveyed it out and commenced selling it. While 
engaged in this business he boarded at my house, in all 
nearly six months. All his leisure hours were occupied 
in writing a historical novel founded upon the first set- 
tlers of this country. He said he intended to trace their 
journey from Jerusalem, by land and sea, till their arrival 
in America ; give an account of their arts, sciences, civili- 
zation, wars and contentions. In this way he would give 
a satisfactory account of all the old mounds so common 
to this country. During the time he was at my house I 
read and heard read one hundred pages or more. Nephi 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



43 



and Lehi were by him represented as leading characters 
when they first started for America. Their main object 
was to escape the judgments which they supposed were 
coming upon the old world. But no religious matter was 
introduced, as I now recollect. . . . When I heard the 
historical part of it (Book of Mormon) related, I at once 
said it was the writings of Solomon Spaulding. Soon 
after I obtained the book, and, on reading it, found much 
of it the same as Spaulding had written more than twenty 
years before." 

Nahum Howard testifies : "I first became acquainted 
with Solomon Spaulding in December 1810. After that 
time I frequently saw him at his house, and also at my 
house. I once, in conversation with him, expressed a 
surprise at not having any account of the mhabitants 
once in this country, who erected the old forts, mounds, 
etc. He then told me that he was writing a history of 
that race of people, and afterwards frequently showed 
me his writings, which I read. I have lately read the 
Book of Mormon, and believe it to be tne same as Spauld- 
ing wrote, except the religious part. He told me that he 
intended to get his writings published in Pittsburg, and 
he thought that in one century from that time it would 
be believed as much as any other history." 

Artemus Cunningham testifies : "In the month of Oc- 
tober, 181 1, I went from the township of Madison to 
Conneaut, for the purpose of securing a debt due me 
from Solomon Spaulding. I tarried with him nearly two 
days for the purpose of accomplishing my object, which 
I was finally unable to do. I found him destitute of the 
means of paying his debts. His only hope of ever paying 
his debts appeared to be upon the sale of a book which 
he had been writing. He endeavored to convince me from 
the nature and character of the work that it would meet 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



with a ready sale. Before showing me his manuscripts, 
he went into a verbal relation of its outlines, saying that 
it was a fabulous or romantic history of the first settle- 
ment of this country, and as it purported to have been 
a record found buried in the earth, or in a cave, he had 
adopted the ancient or Scripture style of writing. He 
then presented his manuscripts, when we sat down and 
spent a good share of the night in reading them and 
conversing upon them. I well remember the name of 
Nephi, which appeared to be the principal hero of the 
story. The frequent repetition of the phrase T Nephi' 
I recollect as distinctly as though it was but yesterday, 
although the general features of the story have passed 
from my memory through the lapse of twenty-two years. 
He attempted to account for the numerous antiquities 
which are found upon this continent, and remarked that 
after this generation had passed away, his account of the 
first inhabitants of America would be considered as au- 
thentic as any other history. The Mormon Bible I have 
partially examined and am fully of the opinion that Solo- 
mon Spaulding had written its outlines before he left 
Conneaut." 

These affidavits were first published in Howe's 
"Mormonism Unveiled," in 1834. And, notwithstanding 
the Mormons have put forth every effort to disprove any 
connection between Spaulding's story and the Book of 
Mormon, they have never succeeded in showing that these 
statements were not made as claimed. All that they have 
ever done is simply blusteringly to deny the testimony, 
and this is characteristic of Mormonism in its dealings 
with all contradictory evidence. But the testimonies of 
these witnesses stand unimpeached as convicting evidence 
against the imposture. 

Since 1834 other acquaintances of Spaulding, who 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



45 



knew him either at Conneaut or Amity, and who heard 
his story read, have added their testimonies to those 
already given upon the close resemblance of the Book 
of Mormon to the "Manuscript Found." 

Joseph Miller, of Amity, under date of February 6, 
1879, as reported in the Pittsburg Telegraph, says : "On 
hearing read the account from the book [of Mormon] 
of the battle between the Amlicites and the Nephites, 
in which the soldiers of one army had placed a red 
mark on their foreheads to distinguish them from their 
enemies, it seems to reproduce in my mind, not only 
the narration, but the very words as they had been im- 
pressed upon my mind by the reading of Spaulding's 
manuscript." 

On April 21, 1879, the following from Redick McKee 
appeared in the Washington (Pa.) Reporter, under date 
of April 14, 1879: "In the fall of 1814 I arrived in the 
village of 'Good Will,' and for eighteen or twenty months 
sold goods in the store previously occupied by Mr. Thos. 
Brice. It was on Main Street, a few doors west of 
Spaulding's tavern, where I was a boarder. With both 
Mr. Solomon Spaulding and his wife I was quite inti- 
mately acquainted. I recollect quite well Mr. Spaulding 
spending much time in writing (on sheets of paper torn 
out of an old book) what purported to be a veritable his- 
tory of the nations or tribes who inhabited Canaan. He 
called it 'Lost History Found,' 'Lost Manuscript,' or some 
such name, not disguising that it was wholly a work of 
the imagination, written to amuse himself and without 
any immediate view to publication. I was struck with 
the minuteness of his details and the apparent truthful- 
ness and sincerity of the author. I have an indistinct 
recollection of the passage referred to by Mr. Miller 
about the Amlicites making a cross with red paint on 



4 6 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



their foreheads to distinguish them from enemies in the 
confusion of battle." 

And Rev. Abner Jackson, on December 20, 1880, 
made the following statement which was published in the 
Washington (Pa.) Reporter of January 7, 1881 : ''Spauld- 
ing frequently read his manuscript to the neighbors and 
amused them as he progressed with the work. He wrote 
it in Bible style. 'And it came to pass' occurred so often 
that some called him 'Old Come-to-pass. ' The Book of 
Mormon follows the romance too closely to be a stranger. 
In both, many persons appear having the same name, as 
Moroni, Mormon, Xephites, Laman, Lamanites, Nephi 
and others. Here we are presented with romance second 
called the Book of Mormon, telling the same story of the 
same people, traveling from the same plain, in the same 
way, having the same difficulties and destination, with 
the same wars, same battles and same results, with thou- 
sands upon thousands slain. Then see the Mormon ac- 
count of the last battle at Cumorah, where all the right- 
eous were slain. How much this resembles the closing 
scene in the 'Manuscript Found.' The most singular part 
of the whole matter is that it follows the romance so 
closely, with this difference : The first claims to be a 
romance; the second claims to be a revelation of God, a 
new Bible. When it was brought to Conneaut and read 
there in public, old Squire Wright heard it and exclaimed, 
'Old Come-to-pass has come to life again.' Here was the 
place where Spaulding wrote and read his manuscript to 
the neighbors for their amusement, and Squire Wright 
had often heard him read from his romance. This was 
in 1832, sixteen years after Spaulding's death. This 
Squire Wright lived on a little farm just outside of the 
little village. I was acquainted with him for twenty- 
five years. I lived on his farm when I was a boy and 



CUM O RAH REVISITED 



47 



attended school in his village. I am particular to notice 
these things to show that I had an opportunity of know- 
ing what I am writing about." 

The evidence in the case goes to show that Spaulding 
wrote several manuscripts; that one of these closely re- 
sembled the Book of Mormon in general historical outline 
and proper names, differing from it in not possessing 
Scriptural quotations and religious matter; that this 
manuscript was placed in the printing establishment of 
one Robert Patterson, of Pittsburg, from which it mys- 
teriously disappeared ; that Spaulding suspected Rigdon 
of the theft ; that at the time the manuscript was in 
Patterson's office Rigdon lived in the vicinity of Pitts- 
burg and was intimate with J. Harrison Lambdin, one 
of Patterson's employes ; that Rigdon had in his posses- 
sion a manuscript which he told Dr. Winter had been 
written by Spaulding ; that he mentioned the coming out 
of a book describing American antiquities and giving an 
account of the first people at least two years before the 
Book of Mormon appeared ; and that he had communica- 
tion with the Smiths before he openly united with the 
Mormons in November, 1830. It would seem that this 
chain of evidence would be sufficient to put the claim, 
that the Book of Mormon originated in one of Spauld- 
ing's romances, beyond the reach of reasonable doubt. 

OUTLINE OF BOOK OF MORMON HISTORY. 

Following the plan of the Bible, the Book of Mormon 
is divided into books of which there are fifteen: 1 Nephi, 
2 Nephi, Jacob, Enos, Jarom, Omni, Words of Mormon, 
Mosiah, Alma, Helaman, Nephi, Disciple of Nephi, Mor- 
mon, Ether and Moroni. Historically they cover a period 
of twenty-six hundred years and describe two distinct 
nations of people, the Jaredites and Nephites ; the Book 



48 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



of Ether being an abridged history of the former, the 
other fourteen of the latter. 

According to the Book of Mormon, the first inhabit- 
ants of America came from the Tower of Babel under 
Jared and his brother, the latter a prophet of the Lord. 
With their following they journeyed from Babel north- 




FIGURE i 



ward into Armenia, from thence westward over southern 
Europe to Spain (the Book of Mormon, Land of Mori- 
ancumer), where they dwelt on the seashore for four 
years. At the close of this period, by the command of 
God, they built eight peculiarly shaped "barges" and put 
to sea, landing, after a voyage of 344 days, upon "the 
east coast of Central America, near the mouth of the 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



49 



river Motagua." — Report of the Committee on American 
Archaeology, p. 70. 

Ether gives the following description of the barges in 
which they are said to have come : "And they were small, 
and they were light upon the water, even like unto the 
lightness of a fowl upon the water; and they were built 
after a manner that they were exceeding tight, even that 
they would hold water like unto a dish ; and the bottom 
thereof was tight like unto a dish; and the sides thereof 
were tight like unto a dish ; and the ends thereof were 
peaked ; and the top thereof was tight like unto a dish ; 
and the length thereof was the length of a tree: and the 
door thereof, when it was shut, was tight like unto a 
dish." — Ether 1 : 5. 

The brother of Jared was puzzled to know how the 
occupants were to get air, so the Lord said: "Behold, 
thou shalt make a hole in the top thereof, and also in the 
bottom thereof; and when thou shalt suffer for air, thou 
shalt unstop the hole thereof, and receive air." — Ether 
1:6. 

For light the Lord touched with his finger sixteen 
small stones which Jared's brother had "moulten" out of 
a rock, and these, placed one in each end of the eight 
barges, gave light to those within. 

Upon reaching Central America the Jaredites 
founded a government and began to settle the country. 
Their Land of Moron comprised about the present 
States of Tabasco, Chiapas, Guatemala and western 
Honduras. Their capital was also called Moron and is 
identified by the Josephite Committee on American Ar- 
chaeology with either Copan or Ouirigua, two ancient 
cities now in ruins. 1 The peninsula of Yucatan was 



1 Report, p. 70. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



called the Land of Xehor ; Mexico, the Land of Heth; 
and the United States is named on the Committee's maps 
the Land Northward. 

Their oldest and richest communities were in the Land 
of Moron, but large and flourishing Jaredite centers ex- 
isted where Xew Orleans, St. Louis and Cincinnati now 
stand, and Jaredite people and culture were spread 
throughout the Mississippi and Ohio Valleys. The Com- 
mittee say : "It appears from the record that at this time 
Central America and a large proportion of the central 
portion of the United States were settled by the Jaredites ; 
in the United States, probably, they occupied mainly in 
the valleys of the Mississippi, Missouri and Ohio Rivers, 
covering largely their watersheds. Omer and Nimrah 
'fled out of the land,' evidently from the countries already 
settled, and probably the chief centers were at New Or- 
leans, St. Louis, Cincinnati, except in Mexico and Central 
America, where the oldest and richest communities 
dwelt." — Report, p. 72. 

The culture of the Jaredites was of a superior order. 
They understood the uses of metals, iron included. They 
manufactured silks and linen goods. They had flocks and 
herds, horses, asses, elephants, "ciirelcms" and "cumoms." 
They had a well-organized government. They worshiped, 
and had intercourse with, God. They had secret so- 
cieties, and they employed a phonetic system of writing. 
All of which belong to a considerable degree of civili- 
zation. 

After dwelling here for sixteen hundred years, being 
ruled over by thirty rulers, 1 suffering from dissensions and 
revolts, and spreading over the extensive territory men- 
tioned, they came to an end in a civil war in a battle 



1 "Joseph the Seer," p. 128. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



5i 



fought in 600 B. C, at Hill Ramah in western New York, 
in which thousands were slain in a few days, only two 
escaping — Coriantumr, one of the generals, and Ether, 
a prophet of the Lord. The former was afterwards dis- 
covered by the people of Zarahemla and dwelt with them 
"nine moons;" Ether wrote a history of his people on a 
set of plates and hid them in such a manner that they 
were discovered by their successors. This, in brief, is 
the history of the first colony of immigrants that came to 
America, as given in the Book of Mormon and outlined 
in Mormon works. 

The book further claims that, in the first year of the 
reign of Zedekiah, king of Judah, there was dwelling at 
Jerusalem a prophet, Lehi by name, a righteous man. On 
account of the wickedness of the city, God commanded 
him to take his family and depart into the wilderness of 
Arabia that he might escape the calamities about to be- 
fall the people on account cf their sins. His family 
consisted of his wife, Saraiah, and his four sons, 
Laman, Lemuel, Sam and Nephi. The first two 
were obstinate and irreligious ; the latter two were 
dutiful and obedient. After their departure the sons 
visited Jerusalem at two different times. They went first 
to obtain a set of brass plates, containing a genealogy of 
their fathers, which were not obtained, however, until 
Laban, their keeper, had been slain by Nephi, when they 
returned to their father bringing the plates and Zoram, 
Laban's servant, who consented to return with diem. By 
the plates Lehi discovered that he was of the tribe of 
Manasseh. The sons visited Jerusalem a second time and 
brought back with them Ishmael and his family, which 
consisted of two sons and five unmarried daughters, who 
became the wives of Lehi's four sons and Zoram. Not 
long after reaching the wilderness Ishmael died and 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



two more sons, Jacob and Joseph, were born to Lehi. 

Eight years having elapsed since Lehi left Jerusalem, 
the little company, which now numbered eight families, 




FIGURE 2. 

by the command of God, built a ship, launched out into 
the Indian Ocean, and, after a stormy voyage, during 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



53 



which the wicked Laman and Lemuel rebelled against 
their brother Nephi, landed "on the coast of Chili, not far 
from the thirtieth degree, south latitude." — Report, p. u. 

Here they found all manner of beasts — the cow, ox, 
ass, horse, goat and wild goat; also such ores as gold, 
silver, iron and copper. Nephi began immediately to keep 
a record of his people, for which purpose he made a set 
cf plates and began to engrave thereon their history in the 
"Reformed Egyptian" language. Lehi, soon afterwards, 
having waxed old,' called his family together, blessed them 
in true patriarchal style, gave up the ghost and was 
buried. With his death the bond that held the two con- 
trary factions together was broken and they drifted apart, 
Laman and Lemuel* and the two sons of Ishmael with 
their families being called Lamanites ; and Nephi, Sam 
and Zoram and their families, with Jacob and Joseph and 
their sisters, being called Nephites. The former were 
savage, indolent and irreligious, because of which God 
cursed them with a dark skin and they "did seek in the 
wilderness for beasts of prey." They were the ancestors 
of our American Indians. The latter were industrious, 
religious and progressive, because of which God blessed 
them abundantly. 

After the separation, the Lamanites established them- 
selves in what is now the State of Rioja in the Argentine 
Republic, 1 while the Nephites went a thousand miles 
farther north and founded the city of Nephi in the pres- 
ent country of Peru. The Committee identify this city 
with the ancient city of Cuzco. Here they built a temple 
like unto Solomon's and instituted a worship similar to 
the Jewish, with Jacob and Joseph as priests. From 
Nephi, being a prolific people, they spread over the ad- 



1 Report, p. 19. 



54 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



jacent country, and what is now northern Chili, western 
Bolivia and Peru was included in the Land of Xephi. Of 
the ancient cities of this region, the Committee identify 
Huanuco, Riobamba. Gran-Chimu and Cuelap-Tingo, 
with the Book of Mormon cities, Ishmael, Amulon, Mid- 
doni and Lehi-Xephi, respectively. After dwelling in this 
region for four hundred years, till aboui. 200 B. C, under 
pressure from the Lamanites to the south of them, they 
moved northward into the Land of Zarahemla, now the 
Lnited States of Colombia and western Venezuela, where 
they united with the people of Zarahemla, or Mulokites, 
who had come from Jerusalem about the time of its 
destruction by Xebuchadnezzar, under Mulek, one of 
Zedekiah's sons. This people had landed upon the west 
coast of the Isthmus of Panama, but had migrated south- 
ward, instead of northward, and had settled in the north- 
ern part of South America. It was among this people 
that Coriantumr, the Jaredite, dwelt "nine moons." The 
Xephites and Mulokites from that time forward were 
one people, the X"ephite king, Mosiah, being their first 
joint ruler. The Book of Mormon river Sidon is identi- 
fied with the Magdalena. From Zarahemla the X'ephites 
spread over the Isthmus of Panama, their Land Bounti- 
ful : Xlcaragua and eastern Honduras, their Land Desola- 
tion ; San Salvador, their Land Joshua : Guatemala and 
western Honduras, their Land Jashon : Chiapas and Ta- 
basco, their Land Antum ; Mexico, their Land Shem ; and 
the Lnited States, their Land of Many Waters. Thus, 
they inhabited the territory previously occupied by the 
Jaredites, with the probable exception of Yucatan, and, 
in addition to it, South America, which was not inhabited 
by their predecessors, but was kept by them as a reserve 
for game. The Committee sav, on the settlements north 
of Mexico: "On entering the L"nited States, the Xephites 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



55 



settled largely in the same sections inhabited by the 
Jaredites, the oldest mound builders, and their march to 
their final conflict was along the same lines." — Report, 
p. 65. 

A Nephite by the name of Hagoth, an "exceeding 
curious man," fitted out a ship and sailed from the 
Isthmus of Panama into the Pacific and was never heard 
of again. Some Mormons have conceived the idea that 
he was the mythical Hawaii who is said to have settled 
the Sandwich Islands. 1 

After Christ's resurrection he is said to have appeared 
to the Nephites ; to have set his church in order with 
twelve apostles ; and to have inaugurated a veritable 
millennium, for, so widespread was the revival imme- 
diately following his appearance, that there ceased to be 
"Lamanites or any manner of ites." But alas ! the bloom- 
ing millennium was soon cut short and the Lamanites 
went back to their old ways, and began to persecute the 
Nephites with relentless fury, which resulted in the 
latter's final overthrow, in 385 A. D., on the same field 
where a thousand years before the Jaredites had been 
exterminated. A few escaped and fled southward, but 
were afterwards destroyed, though some Mormons as- 
sert that they were absorbed among the Lamanites and 
that from them came the tribes of "white Indians," such 
as the Mandans and Menominees. 

Moroni, the last of the Nephites of royal blood, com- 
pleted the record of his people upon the plates, adding an 
abridgment of the record of Ether, and deposited them in 
"Hill Cumorah" (the Jaredite Ramah or Riplah, known 
to vulgar Gentiles as "Mormon Hill," which lies south- 
east of Palmyra, N. Y.) in 420 A. D., from which, it is 



1 "Book of Mormon Lectures," p. 206. 



56 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



claimed, they were taken by Joseph Smith on September 
22, 1827. 

The Nephites, like the Jaredites, were highly cultured. 
They worshiped the one true God. They observed the 
Jewish law up to the time of Christ, when they became 
Christians. They worked the metals. They built temples, 
synagogues, sanctuaries and houses of cement. They 
were agriculturists, warriors and tradesmen. And they 
had a phonetic system of writing. 

Reader, this is, briefly, the history of ancient America 
as given in the Book of Mormon and outlined in the Re- 
port of the Committee on x\merican Archaeology and 
Other Mormon works. There are slight differences be- 
tween the Mormon churches in the establishment of cer- 
tain boundary lines and the location of certain places, 
but, in the main, this will be considered a fair outline 
of ancient American history by 350,000 human souls. 
Will it stand the test of investigation? We shall see. 

THE BOOK OF MORMON AND AMERICAN ARCHAEOLOGY. 

The Book of Mormon, coming to us with the claim 
of divine inspiration, demands our acceptance under pain 
of eternal damnation. Apostle Orson Pratt sets the case 
fairly before us, from the Mormon point of view, in these 
words : "The nature of the message in the Book of Mor- 
mon is such, that, if true, no one can possibly be saved 
and reject it; if false, no one can possibly be saved and 
receive it. Therefore, every soul in all the world is 
equally interested in ascertaining its truth or falsity." 
— O. Pratt's Works, p. 68. 

It is also conceded by Mormons themselves that the 
integrity of their system is so dependent upon the authen- 
ticity of the Book of Mormon that to prove it false is to 
overthrow the entire Mormon superstructure. "It is very 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



57 



evident," says Elder George Reynolds, "that if the Book 
of Mormon is not of God, then the whole superstructure 
of Mormonism is, of necessity, a gross imposture, the 
crudest of religious deception that for many centuries 
has misled humanity." — The Myth of the Manuscript 
Found, pp. 9, 10. 

The claims of the Book of Mormon must be con- 
sidered from four points of view : 

First, from the viewpoint of a possible human author- 
ship. Did it originate in the writings of Solomon Spauld- 
ing? 

Secondly, from the viewpoint of itself as a religio- 
literary production. Do its structure., doctrinal teachings 
and moral precepts evince its divine inspiration? 

Thirdly, from the viewpoint of prophecy. Are the 
prophecies of the Old and New Testaments, which are 
applied to its "coming forth," rightly applied or mis- 
applied ? 

And fourthly, from the viewpoint of American ar- 
chaeology and ethnology. Are its historical statements 
substantiated by archaeological and ethnological research? 

It is my intention, in the following pages, to consider 
its claims from the viewpoint of American archaeology 
and ethnology, for the purpose of showing that it is 
not a credible history of ancient America, but a work of 
pure fiction, false in its historical accounts, and in its 
descriptions of the customs, habits, religion, government 
and character of the first Americans. In order to ac- 
complish this, I shall put before the reader the facts as 
established by the latest research as these are given in 
the works of the latest and best authors. The opinions 
of the older writers will be made use of only so far as 
they agree with these facts. 

Mormon writers confidently assert that the data ac- 



58 CUM OR AH REVISITED 

quired by scientific investigation in the fields of American 
archaeology and ethnology fully substantiate the claims 
of the Book of Mormon. This will be seen in the follow - 
: :^g quotations from authorities in the two great branches 
f the Mormon Church. 

"The Book of Mormon statements have since been 
erified by facts, the later and best authorities concurring 
ith the Book of Mormon idea." — Report of the Com- 
t. ittee on American Archaeology, p. 96. 

"The historical accounts recorded in the book are 
being rapidly substantiated by American archaeological 
research." — Elder C. J. Hunt in Opinions of Sixty-five 
Leading Ministers and Bible Commentators on Isa. 29: 
11-24 an d Ezek. 37: 15-20, pp. 3, 4. 

"The students of American antiquities will find upon 
a careful examination that no discovery has thus far been 
made which in a single instance contradicts the record of 
America's great and glorious past, as found in the Book 
of Mormon." — Elder R. Etzenhonser , in "The Book Un- 
sealed/' p. 78. 

"So the 'Book of Mormon' still stands like a very 
Gibraltar, undisturbed by ridicule, scatching criticism, 
or scientific demonstration." — Apostle W. H. Kelley, in 
"Presidency and Priesthood/' p. 286. 

"For not only are the principles of the gospel of Christ 
great and eternal truths, which we preach, but the book 
under discussion, as the history of ancient American 
peoples, is also true and fully substantiated, not only by 
Bible prophecies, but also by abundant discoveries of 
science, by a wonderful array of archaeological ruins and 
antiquarian remains, by many historical facts developed 
since its publication, by the traditional history of tribes 
and nations, and, finally, by the internal evidences found 
in the book itself, they being historical, geographical and 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



59 



doctrinal in their character, and strong in proof." — Elder 
H. A. Stebbins, in "Book of Mormon Lectures," p. 3. 

President W. W. Blair declares that the facts stated 
in the book have since been "fully attested by the anti- 
quarian and the geologist." — Joseph the Seer, p. 175. 

And Apostle Orson Pratt asserts that "there can net 
be found one truth among all the gleanings of antiquity 
that clashes with the historical truths of the Book of 
Mormon." — 0. Pratt's Works, p. 153. 

These extracts from the works of prominent Mormon 
writers on the relation of the sciences of archaeology and 
ethnology to the question of the credibility and historical 
accuracy of the Book of Mormon, show the interest of 
the Mormon people in, and their expectations from, ar- 
chaeological and ethnological research. 



6o 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



CHAPTER II. 

The Origin of Man in America — The Antiquity of Man in 
America — How Man Reached America — The Historic Tribes 
and Nations of America — The Ruins of America — Tradi- 
tional History of America — Archseological Knowledge in 1830. 

When the Europeans discovered America they found 
here nations of various degrees of culture, from the low- 
est savage who eked out a miserable existence by hunting 
and fishing, to the semi-civilized tribes of Peru, Central 
America and Mexico. These all belonged to one race, 
separated from the peoples of the Old World in a body, 
and partook of the same general physical characteristics. 
Dr. Brinton, professor of American archaeology and lin- 
guistics in the University of Pennsylvania, remarks upon 
the homogeneousness of the American race as follows: 
"The American race is physically more homogeneous than 
any other on the globe. There is no mistaking a group 
of American Indians, whether they come from Chili or 
from Canada, from the shores of Hudson Bay or the 
banks of the Amazon. And this superficial resemblance 
is a correct indication of what a close anatomical study 
confirms." — Myths of the New World, p. 52. 

Yet, notwithstanding this general physical uniformity, 
there ar^ wide inter-racial variations. The majority of 
American tribes are prevailingly meso- or brachycephal- 
ic, but in a few the long-headed type of skull prevails. 
Of these, Brinton mentions the Eskimo of the north, the 
Tapuyas of Brazil and the Aymaras of Peru, while the 
cephalic index of the Yumas has been noticed to run as 
low as 68. In color the American tribes vary from a 
light ash color to a very dark, almost black, shade of 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



61 



complexion. These variations are not, however, in refer- 
ence to climate, the Yurucares of the torrid zone being 
light, while the Kaws of the north temperate are very 
dark. The hair is generally coarse, straight and black, 
but cases are known in which it is fine and silky and even 
wavy or curly. When carefully examined, it reveals an 
undercolor of red very noticeable in some tribes, espe- 
cially among the children. The growth is usually thick 
and strong on the head, but scanty on the body and face, 
and yet instances are recorded of tribes with full beards. 
Within some tribes individuals have been observed with 
light hair and light eyes. The Americans also vary in 
stature, the Patagonians being frequently over six feet in 
height, while the Warraus are below medium ; though no 
tribes are as dwarfish as the Lapps and Bushmen. The 
arms are generally long and the hands and feet small in 
comparison with those of the Europeans. 1 

Whatever may have been their origin, one thing is 
certain : the people of this continent have been so long 
separated from the rest of mankind as to set themselves 
off in a body by themselves, distinct from all other races 
in language, color and culture, and are to be recognized, 
not as a branch of the Mongolian, Polynesian or Cauca- 
sian family, but as a distinct family by themselves, for 
which the Anthropological Society of Washington has 
suggested the name " Amerind," a combination of the first 
syllables of American and Indian. "They constitute," 
says Brinton, "as true and distinct a sub-species as do the 
African or the White Race." — Essays of an Americanist, 
p. 17. 

For our knowledge of the Amerind of the past, we 
have to depend upon oral and, more or less, uncertain 



1 "The American Race," pp. 36-40. 



62 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



traditions handed down from father to son through num- 
berless generations ; the picture-writing of the Aztecs and 
the more developed system of the Mayas, their southern 
neighbors ; the writings of the Spanish and French priests 
and English missionaries, with those of the native con- 
verts, conquistadors, travelers and explorers ; the "actual 
condition, institutions and beliefs" of the tribes at the 
time of the Discovery ; the lingual affinities between the 
tribes; and the material monuments of ruined cities, 
mounds and fortifications with other archaeological re- 
mains. 

THE ORIGIN OF MAN IN AMERICA. 

It has long been a question with anthropologists 
whether to consider the distinct races of men as separate 
creations or as types of one species descended from a 
common source. Those who believe in man's specific 
diversity have advocated their side of the question with a 
degree of zeal and a display of learning quite remarkable, 
and yet the argument still seems to be on the side of those 
who believe with Paul that God "hath made of one blood 
all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the 
earth; and hath determined the times before appointed, 
and the bounds of their habitation" (Acts 17:26). On 
this point Dr. Brinton says : "But now, after weighing 
the question maturely, we are compelled to admit that the 
apostle was not so wide of the mark after all — that, in 
fact, the latest and best authorities, with no bias in his 
favor, support his position and may almost be said to 
paraphrase his words. For, according to a late writer 
whose work is still a standard in the science of ethnology, 
the severest and most patient investigations show that 
'not only do acknowledged facts permit the assumption 
of the unity of the human species, but this opinion is 
attended with fewer discrepancies, and has greater inner 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



63 



consistency, than the opposite one of specific diversity.' " 
— Myths of the New World, p. 14. 

Prominent among the advocates of the diversity of 
the human species was Dr. Samuel George Morton, 
who wrote in its defense his well-known works, "Crania 
Americana" and "Crania Egyptiaca." His investigations 
were confined, however, to the first half of the nineteenth 
century, he dying May 15, 185 1. After his death his 
disciples, Dr. J. C. Nott and Mr. George R. Gliddon, 
defended his views in their "Types of Mankind." Louis 
Agassiz was also of this opinion and divided humanity 
into eight distinct types which, he thought, originated 
independently of each other and in special adaptation to 
the climate and environment of those regions where they 
dwelt. These types are the Arctic, Mongol, European, 
American, Negro, Hottentot, Malay and Australian. 

It hardly needs to be said that this theory, which at 
the time of its introduction caused no little stir in scien- 
tific and religious circles, so far as it relates to the ques- 
tion of the origin of the American race, has but few 
supporters to-day, the recent studies in biology and an- 
thropology putting it in no very favorable light. 1 "On 
the one hand," says Brinton, "the laws of the evolution 
of the higher vertebrates offer no support to the idea 
that the species man was developed on the American 
continent. Its living and fossil fauna are alike devoid 
of high apes, of tailless monkeys, or those with thirty-two 
teeth; in the absence of which links we must accept man 
as an immigrant, not a native in the New World. Nor 
can we place his advent extremely remote." — Myths of 
the New World, p. 48. 



1 The theory of "monogenism," or the specific unity of man, is now 
adopted by most anthropologists. — "Myths of the New World," p. 14, 
Footnote. 



64 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Those who hold to the theory that American man 
came from the Old World are divided among themselves 
in their opinions as to the country from which he came, 
Some have suggested China, others Polynesia, others 
Phenicia, others Atlantis, and still others Palestine. Vol- 
umes have been written on these different theories, and 
numberless analogies in custom, habit, institution and 
belief have been pointed out to prove them, but, notwith- 
standing all this, these theories have passed away before 
the advance of scientific research. Brinton remarks : "For 
all those old dreams of the advent of the Ten Lost Tribes, 
of Buddhist priests, of Welsh princes, or of Phenician 
merchants on American soil, and there exerting a perma- 
nent influence, have been consigned to the dust-bin by 
every unbiased student, and when we see learned men 
essaying to resuscitate them, we regretfully look upon it 
in the light of a scientific anacronism. The most com- 
petent observers are agreed that American art bears the 
indisputable stamp of its indigenous growth. Those anal- 
ogies and identities which have been brought forward to 
prove its Asiatic or European or Polynesian origin, 
whether in myth, folklore or technical details, belong 
wholly and only to the uniform development of human 
culture under similar conditions. This is their true an- 
thropological interpretation, and we need no other." — 
Myths of the New World, pp. 33, 34. 

The data which we have at hand make it necessary 
for us to reject the assumption that the American Indian 
is a descendant of some one, or of a number, of the his- 
toric nations. His physical peculiarities, his languages 
and the characteristic features of his culture all combine 
to refute such a hypothesis. On the contrary, these evi- 
dences go to show that he must have come to America in 
the dim, distant ages of the past, long before the erection 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



65 



of the pyramids of ancient Egypt and the palaces and 
temples of ancient Babylon, and when he and his fellows 
were still chippers of stone, and developed here upon this 
continent in conformity with its climate and environments 
and the laws of his own nature. This theory is rapidly 
being confirmed by the data which are being brought to 
light by scientific investigation. 1 

The "area of characterization," or the locality where 
American man received the peculiar physical stamp 
characteristic of his race, Brinton would locate in North 
America, east of the Rocky Mountains and between the 
receding wall of the glacial ice-sheet and the Gulf of 
Mexico. His reasons for this belief are the proximity of 
this region to the land areas of the Old World ; the 
inadaptation of the race to the tropical climate ; their sus- 
ceptibility to hepatic disorders and diseases of the torrid 
zone; the robust physique of the tribes of the temperate 
regions, as compared with those of the tropics; and the 
fact that in North America "we find the oldest signs of 
man's residence on the continent." 2 

THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN IN AMERICA. 

On the antiquity of man the opinions of anthropolo- 
gists vary widely. Professor Winchell states that man's 
antiquity "may reach a hundred thousand years." 3 And 
Dr. Brinton thinks that man may have been in the Dela- 
ware Valley even longer ago than that. 4 On the other 
hand, Dawson declares that the "four or five thousand 
years for the postdiluvian period, and two thousand, or 
a little more, for the antediluvian period, will exhaust all 

1 "North Americans of Yesterday," p. 14. 

2 "The American Race," p. 35. 

3 "Preadamites," p. 473. 

* "Essays of an Americanist," p. 53, 



66 



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the time that geology can allow for the possible existence 
of man." 1 

With reference to the glacial period, man's origin is 
preglacial, glacial or postglacial. To arrive, therefore, 
at any conclusion whatever as to his antiquity, it is first 
necessary to locate, approximately, this period. The 
Glacial Age has been put back in the history of the world 
1,280,000,000 years. Lyell's first estimate brought it to a 
close 800,000,000 years ago, but this he subsequently low- 
ered to 200,000,000 years. 2 But, since Lyell's day, esti- 
mates as to the length of the geological periods have been 
greatly cut down, and Professor Wright now tells us that 
geological time is not a hundredth part as long as it was 
once supposed to be. Of more recent estimates on the 
close of this age, Brinton says : "As you are aware, the 
attempt has several times been made to fix the final retro- 
cession of the glaciers of North America. The estimates 
have varied from about 12,000 years ago up to 50,000, 
with a majority in favor of about 35,000 years." — Essays 
of an Americanist, p. 41. 

The late writer on American anthropology, F. S. Del- 
lenbaugh, following Gilbert, would, however, reduce even 
the lowest of these estimates. He says: "The period of 
time that has elapsed since the so-called disappearance 
of the ice was formerly believed to be very great, but 
latterly views on this point have been much modified. 
Gilbert has declared, after a study of the Niagara gorge, 
that the time since the ice left that region is not more 
than seven thousand years, perhaps less. More recent 
investigations have tended to confirm his suggestion of 

1 "Present-day Tracts, Xo. 42," p. 22. 

2 "Science of the Day and Genesis," p. 105. I give these figures 
wholly on the authority of Dr. Nisbet. I have not been able to trace them 
further, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



6? 



fewer years." — North Americans of Yesterday, p. 441. 

This seems to be in agreement with the results of the 
investigations of other geologists in other localities. Pro- 
fessor Andrews estimated, after making observations on 
the beaches of Lake Michigan, that a period of time 
somewhere between 5,500 and 7,500 years has elapsed 
since the deposits of the Glacial Age were made. 1 And 
Professor Winchell, by comparing the present rate of 
wear with the chasm worn at St. Anthony's Falls, 
obtained, as the mean result of the different estimates, 
8,859 years as the length of time between our own and 
the retrocession of the glaciers of that locality. 2 On the 
recent close of the glacial period, Prof. G. F. Wright 
says : "The glacial period did not close more than ten 
thousand years ago. This shortening of our conception 
of the ice age renders glacial man a comparatively mod- 
ern creature. The last stage of the excessive unstability 
of the earth was not so very long ago and continued down 
to near the introduction of man." 3 

Confining our attention to the American continent, 
we find no well-authenticated evidence that man came 
before the glacial period. As for the indications of his 
existence during that period, they are vague and uncer- 
tain, in consequence of which archaeologists differ, some 
holding that he came before the ice receded, and others 
holding that he came after. Among those of the former 
class may be mentioned the names of Wilson, Wright, 
Abbott and Putnam ; and of the latter, Dawson, Holmes, 
Fowke, McGee, Thomas and Russell. 

Professor Thomas writes : "The writer, as those who 
peruse this work will observe, has not entered into a dis- 



1 "Story of the Earth and Man," p. 295. 

2 "Science of the Day and Genesis," p. 109. 

3 "The Other Side of Evolution," p. 95. 



68 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



cussion of the question of the so-called paleolithic age, or 
glacial man in America, for the reason that he does net 
believe the evidence on which the theory is based as yet 
sufficient to justify its acceptance. The results of the 
more recent investigations in America, or at least North 
America, all tend in the other direction. One by one the 
strongholds of the advocates are being overturned, and 
the evidence on which the theory is based discounted." — 
Introduction to the Study of North American Archae- 
ology, P- 5- 

And Prof. Israel Cook Russell, professor of geology 
in the University of Michigan, in his late work, "North 
America," p. 362, says : "Turning to the geological 
records, we find no authentic and well-attested evidence 
of the presence of man in America either previous to or 
during the glacial period. ... In brief, all the geological 
evidence thus far gathered bearing on the antiquity of 
man in America points to the conclusion that he came 
after the glacial epoch. Judgment in this respect, how- 
ever, should be held in abeyance, as the search for evi- 
dence is as yet incomplete." 

One by one the evidences of the extreme antiquity of 
American man have been overturned. The fossil Guada- 
loupe man, which Nott and Gliddon declared to be of a 
great age, was shown by Professor Dana to be the body 
of a Carib Indian two or three centuries old. Agassiz 
gave the Florida bone an antiquity of fourteen thousand 
years ; but its finder, Count Portales, declared that it was 
not found imbedded in coral rock, as was supposed, but 
in fresh- water sandstone on the shores of Lake Monroe, 
Florida, associated with the shells of fresh-water species 
now living. Of the Natchez bone, which was thought to 
date back to preglacial times, Winchell says : "From be- 
ing the relic of a preglacial man it -suddenly became the 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



69 



bone of a red Indian, perhaps a hundred and fifty years 
old." — Preadamites, p. 425. And Dr. Dowler estimated 
that the New Orleans skeleton, found buried under six- 
teen feet of river mud and four successive cypress for- 
ests, was 57,000 years old. This estimate was approved 
by Charles Lyell. On the contrary, the engineers, Hum- 
phreys and Abbott, claim that the ground upon which 
New Orleans now stands, to the depth of forty feet, has 
been deposited within 4,400 years ; while Dr. Foster 
claims that the so-called cypress forests are nothing more 
than driftwood carried down the Mississippi and imbed- 
ded in the sediment. 1 

But, perhaps, the piece of evidence that has been con- 
sidered the most important, as proving the existence of 
Tertiary man in America, is the renowned Calaveras skull 
said to have been found in a mine-shaft at Altaville, Cal- 
ifornia, in 1866. Winchell declares that this is the "best 
authenticated instance of Pliocene man which has been 
brought to light," and it has been accepted as such by a 
number of other scientists, although there never has been 
a time when some have not held it in doubt. According 
to Professor Whitney, who was one of the first geologists 
to examine this skull, it was found in Mattison & Co.'s 
mine, 130 feet under the ground, being taken from a bed 
of gravel by Mr. Mattison himself, who at first thought it 
was only a piece of the root of a tree. When delivered 
to Whitney, the base of the skull was incrusted "in a 
conglomerate mass of ferruginous earth, water-worn 
pebbles of much altered volcanic rock, calcareous tufa, 
and fragments of bones," which gave it the appearance 
of a great antiquity. Whitney wrote a defense of its 
genuineness and the find was heralded throughout both 



1 "Science and Genesis," pp. 84, 85. 



70 



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Europe and America as positive proof of the existence of 
preglacial man upon this continent. But many scientists 
have never been convinced of its high antiquity. There 
is a "practical identity of the skull with modern crania" 
which "speaks very eloquently against extreme antiquity," 
it being very closely analogous to the skulls of the Digger 
Indians who inhabited that region when the skull was 
found. Its claim to a high antiquity is also weakened by 
the report current at the time of its finding that it was 
an Indian skull which was coated with gravel, buried at 
the bottom of the mine, and afterwards taken out to hoax 
a certain doctor of the place. Mr. W. H. Holmes, who 
does not believe in its high antiquity, has reviewed the 
evidences in the case in a convincing manner in Bulletin 
1242 of the Smithsonian Institution, entitled "Review of 
the Evidence Relating to Auriferous Gravel Man in Cali- 
fornia." 

The rinding of human bones and implements with 
the bones of the mastodon has been taken by some as 
strong evidence of the great age of the species man in 
America. This assumption, however, will not stand in 
the light of geological and archaeological research, for it 
is now a well-known fact that mastodon bones have been 
taken from peat beds, which, judging by the present rate 
of deposit, are not more than five hundred years old. 
This brings the mastodon down to a comparatively recent 
date. "Mastodon bones," says Professor Henshaw, "have 
been exhumed from peat beds in this country at a depth 
which, so far as is proved by the rate of deposition, 
implies that the animal may have been alive within five 
hundred years." — Second Report Bit. Amer. Ethno., p. 
153- 

On the antiquity of American man, the chronological 
systems of the Mexicans, Mayas and Peruvians throw no 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



light, as they carry us back but comparatively few cen- 
turies before the Discovery. The annals of the Mayas 
reach back nearly to the beginning of the Christian era, 
where they fade into the mythical, while those of the 
Nahuas, Bancroft declares, "reach back chronologically, 
although not uninterruptedly, to the sixth century of our 
era." And, as for Peru, great uncertainty shrouds its 
history after a few centuries back of the invasion of the 
Spaniards, and this grows denser and deeper as we go 
further back. 

Because of the uncertainties that have crowded into 
the American traditions, the events they describe are 
accepted as historical only so far as they are borne out 
by other evidences. The tradition that the Nahuas came 
from a more northern latitude, therefore, is established 
by the linguistic evidences which we have of such a 
migration. And it may be received as historically true 
that Peru has had two, or more, epochs in her history. 
While the former existence of a powerful Maya em- 
pire in the region of the Usumacinta rests upon some- 
thing more than vague tradition, it has to prove it the 
crumbling palaces and temples of Palenque, Copan and 
Quirigua. 

One of the most reasonable grounds for demanding 
a high antiquity for the American race is found in its 
languages. Here we find a diversity greater than is to be 
found among any other race on the globe. In fact, the 
American languages, 450 in number, as given by Reclus, 
exceed in number those in use in all the rest of the earth. 
It is said that in Mexico alone there are nineteen linguistic 
stocks, divided into 108 distinct languages, and upwards 
of sixty dialects. The great Algonkin family, which orig- 
inally stretched from the Rockies to the Atlantic, con- 
tains, according to Brinton, twenty-six distinct languages. 



72 



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And this diversity extends throughout the two Americas 
until it is safe to conjecture that the number of dialects 
in both continents exceeds two thousand. 

American languages have changed slowly. While 
tribes have dropped some words and invented others, 
often on account of superstitious caprice, the radicals 
and structure of the different languages have remained 
unchanged for untold ages, and, because of this, "they 
form the safest guide now available in the classification 
of the various branches of the Amerind race." — North 
Americans of Yesterday, p. 25. 

Some philologists, despairing of ever tracing the 
American languages back to a common point of diverg- 
ence, are of the opinion that they sprang from several 
linguistic centers. Powell, whose ability as an American 
philologist none will question, after an exhaustive study 
of the tongues of North America, writes: "The North 
American Indian tribes, instead of speaking related dia- 
lects, originating in a single parent language, in reality 
speak many languages, belonging to distinct families, 
which have no apparent unity of origin." It was his 
belief that there was no "single primitive speech common 
to mankind," but that the human race "spread through- 
out the habitable earth anterior to the development of 
organized languages," and that the different tongues of 
men sprang from distinct centers after their dispersion. 1 

But to other philologists this great linguistic diversity 
is only a forceful argument for the high antiquity of 
man upon this continent. "To me," says Brinton, "the 
exceeding diversity of languages in America and the 
many dialects into which these have split, are cogent 
proofs of the vast antiquity of the race, an antiquity 



1 "First Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 79. 



CVMORAII REVISITED 73 

stretching back tens of thousands of years. Nothing 
less can explain these multitudinous forms of speech." — 
Essays of an Americanist, p. 35. 

The conclusion upon which we all can agree is that 
the marvelous diversity of his languages demands for 
American man the highest antiquity the other evidences 
will allow, which will at least carry him back to the 
close of the glacial epoch. 

HOW MAN REACHED AMERICA. 

This brings us to another question: How did man 
reach America ? Three ways have been proposed for the 
peopling of this continent by those who hold to the exotic 
origin of the American race : by vessel, either intention- 
ally or accidentally ; by way of Behring Strait, and over 
lands now submerged beneath the ocean. 

Those who hold that America was peopled by immi- 
grants from the Old World who crossed the sea in ships, 
and with the intention of inhabiting this continent, were 
numerous a century ago. They differed among them- 
selves as to the country from which the populators came, 
some claiming Babel, others Polynesia, others Phoenicia, 
others Scandinavia and some Atlantis as the original 
home of these immigrants. Probably the most unreason- 
able of all these theories, and yet the one that has out- 
lived all the others, is that they were Jaredites from Babel 
and Jews from Jerusalem. Those who think that this 
continent was peopled accidentally, by crews of vessels 
wrecked upon our shores, are with us to-day. Professor 
Shaler is of the opinion that the first men were either 
Japanese or Chinese who were floated on "chance rafts" 
by the ocean and atmospheric currents to our Pacific 
shore. He also states that it is "barely possible" that 
ships from the Mediterranean may have been carried by 



74 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



wind and wave to the coast of South America, although, 
he says, ''the distance is, however, so great, ?nd the time 
of the journey so long, that it is improbable that a ship 
scantily provisioned, as were the vessels of old, should 
have borne living voyagers across this wide field of 
waters." — Nature and Man in America, p. 178. But, 
while Mongolian vessels have actually reached our Pacific 
coast at the rate of two per year, it is very unlikely that 
our continent was peopled in that chance w T ay, for the 
number of vessels afloat two thousand years ago was 
nothing as compared to the number afloat to-day. The 
majority of students are of the opinion that some other 
way will have to be found to account for the peopling of 
this continent. 

The most generally accepted theory is that the first 
inhabitants of America came from northeastern Asia 
across Behring Strait. The proximity of the continents 
of Asia and America at the north has made such a theory 
appear most plausible. It is also known that there has 
been, for a number of centuries, intercommunication be- 
tween the tribes of Alaska and Siberia, for the Eskimo 
have carried on a regular traffic with the Russian traders, 
while the Tchutski have made hostile inroads upon the 
tribes on this side of the strait. But, within historic 
times at least, immigration has been into Asia from 
America, instead of in the opposite direction, and Behr- 
ing found the Aleutians nearest Kamschatka uninhabited, 
while those nearest the American side were inhabited by 
tribes with unmistakable American affinities. Dr. Brinton 
also offers two serious objections to this route: "We 
know that Siberia was not peopled till late in the Neo- 
lithic times" — the first Americans being Paleolithic men, 
the inference is, then, that the continent was inhabited 
before Siberia — "and, what is more, that the vicinity of 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



75 



the strait and the whole coast of Alaska were, till a very 
modern geologic period, covered by enormous glaciers 
which would have prevented any communication between 
the two continents." — The American Race, p. 21. But, 
be this as it may, one thing is very certain : if the western 
continent was peopled from Asia, via Behring Strait, it 
was not by those highly cultivated nations from the 
southern parts. To suppose that Egyptians, Israelites or 
Hindoos would leave a warm climate and journey hun- 
dreds of miles through a zone of ice, which is devoid of 
the fruits and cereals upon which they depended in a 
great measure for sustenance, carrying with them their 
arts, customs, habits, religion and language, in order to 
reach a land of which they could have heard only by the 
most uncertain rumors, if at all, is too absurd to think 
about. If, then, America was peopled from the north- 
west, it must have been by slow stages and successive 
waves of immigration and by tribes accustomed to the 
rigorous Arctic climate. 

But, admitting this as a possible route for immigrants 
accustomed to the severity and food supply of a cold 
climate, and even admitting the possibility of a few im- 
migrants reaching our shores through the agency of 
wind and wave, there is a better theory which accounts 
for the peopling of America upon the hypothesis that 
there formerly existed a land-bridge, or land-bridges, by 
which men passed from continent to continent. That 
such land surfaces once existed, linking the continents 
together, is an established fact Such sunken lands are 
revealed by soundings, and there seems to be evidence of 
their former existence in the fauna and flora of the New 
World. Brinton claims that, from the period of the 
Eocene down to the close of the Pliocene, America 
and Europe were connected on the north by such sur- 



76 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



faces, of which Greenland, Iceland, Shetland and the 
Orkneys were the highest elevations. Prof. James Geikie 
claims that in the glacial and early postglacial ages the 
north Atlantic bed was raised three thousand feet above 
its present level, constituting a continuous land passage 
from Europe to America. And Mr. James Croll declares 
that the glacial striae, on the rocks of Shetland, Iceland, 
the Faroe Islands and south Greenland, are in such direc- 
tions and of such a character as to show clearly that they 
have been produced by land ice, and that a theory of land 
connection between Europe and America ''can alone ex- 
plain all the facts." 1 

There also seems to be clearly established evidence in 
the fauna and flora that the continents of Europe and 
North America were at one time connected. Certain 
species of land snails are found in both Labrador and 
Europe. The horse, which is commonly supposed to be- 
long to the Old World, is now known to have been a 
native of America in the earlier geologic epochs. The 
cave bear of Europe was identical with our Rocky Moun- 
tain grizzly. Remains of the mammoth are found in both 
continents. The musk-ox, once common in Europe, still 
lives in Arctic America. Rutimeyer declares that the 
ancient bison (Bos priscus) of Europe was the same as 
the American buffalo. The fossil remains of the camel, 
it is said, have been found in South America and Kansas. 
The glutton of northern Europe and the wolverine of the 
United States are the same. Remains of the European 
cave lion and cave wolf are met with in America. And 
the Cervus Americamis , discovered in Kentucky, was as 
large as and resembled the Irish elk. 2 

The flora of northern Greenland is American; that of 



1 "The American Race," pp. 29-32. 
s "Atlantis," p. 55. 



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77 



southern Greenland is European. The flora of the Mio- 
cene in Europe still lives in the forests of Virginia, the 
Carolinas and Florida in such familiar trees as the mag- 
nolia, tulip-tree, maple, evergreen oak, plane-tree, robinas 
and sequoias. And of three thousand plants, found in 
the Miocene fossil beds of Switzerland, the majority are 
found in America. 1 This identity of fauna and flora can 
best be explained by the theory of land surfaces connect- 
ing the continents, and, if these formed a bridge for 
plants and animals to pass over, as they continued into 
postglacial time, 2 they may also have formed a bridge 
over which man passed from the Old World into the 
New. 

It is possible that the first immigrants to America 
reached our shores at different times and in all three of 
the ways suggested, but it seems most probable that the 
bulk of the ancient population came over land surfaces 
now submerged and when in a very low state of culture, 
and that the subsidence of these lands, isolating the 
people from the Old World, was one of the means of 
establishing here a distinct type of men — the American 
race. These, isolated from the men of the other con- 
tinent, and with numbers increased only occasionally by 
small and insignificant influxes of immigration, which 
were not sufficient to tinge the stock, developed here on 
American soil, and under the influence of American 
climate and environment, a culture peculiarly American, 
of which the Mayas, Mexicans and Peruvians, at the 
time of the Discovery, exhibited the highest phase, and 
which bore but few special resemblances to that of Old 
World nations and only such as can be accounted for 
upon the hypothesis that two peoples, in similar condi- 



1 "Atlantis," p. 56. 

2 "Earth and Man," pp. 288, 289. 



78 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



tions and grades of development, will do the same thing 
alike. This is the theory accepted by a considerable 
number of American ethnologists, and is confirmed by 
the great mass of data which we have at hand. 

THE HISTORIC TRIBES AXD XATI0XS OF AMERICA. 

The American race is divided into 180 separate lin- 
guistic stocks, of which eighty are found in Xorth and 
one hundred in South America. These stocks, in turn, 
are subdivided into tribes which speak dialects differing, 
in some instances, from one another as much as the 
German differs from the English, yet with a thread of 
homogeneitv running through them all that proves their 
primitive unity. 

As it would be impossible and unnecessary for me to 
describe and locate all the tribes of this continent, which 
would require a book of several hundred pages, I shall 
content myself with speaking only of those who are most 
important, or who are in some way connected with the 
argument of this book. 

In the far north we have the Eskimo, or Innuit, who 
are an arctic and a maritime people inhabiting the coasts 
of the Arctic Ocean, from Alaska eastward to Labra- 
dor, Greenland and the islands of the Northern Sea. 
Some ethnologists claim that they do not belong to the 
American race at all, but are of Asiatic origin, while 
others believe that they are a distinct race by themselves. 

South of the Eskimo and stretching almost . from 
Hudson Bay on the east to the Pacific Ocean on the west 
and from the territory of the Eskimo on the north to 
British Columbia on the south, are the tribes of the 
Tinne or Athapascan stock. A branch of this stock, of 
which the Apaches and the Xavajos are tribes, is found 
in Arizona and Xew Mexico wedged in between the Uto- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 79 



Aztecan tribes of Utah and adjacent territory and those 
of Mexico. 

Along our Pacific Coast, from Alaska southward into 




FIGURE 3. 



Lower California, are a number of small, but independ- 
ent, stocks of which the most important are the Kolu- 
schan, Chimmesyan, Skittagetan, Salishan, Wakashan, 
Chinookan, Sahaptian, Mariposan, Yuman, Piman and 



8o 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Serian. Brinton tells us that of the fifty-nine stocks in 
North America north of Mexico "no less than forty . . . 
were confined to the narrow strip of land between the 
Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Ocean." — American 
Race, p. 57. 

The Algonkins, originally, extended from the Rocky 
Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean and from Hudson Bay 
to the Carolinas. These Indians were the skillful hunt- 
ers, bold warriors and typical Americans of whom Pon- 
tiac, Tecumseh and Black Hawk were notable examples. 
Among their tribes are the Mohicans, Lenapes, Shaw- 
nees, Miamis, Chippeways, Ottawas, Pottawatamies, Sacs 
and Foxes, Kickapoos, Menominees, Crees, Cheyennes, 
Arapahoes and Blackfeet. 

The Iroquoians occupied the valley of the St. Law- 
rence and the State of New York. The Cherokees also 
belong to this stock, and when the whites came were 
dwelling in the mountainous country of eastern Tennes- 
'see and Kentucky, northern Alabama and western Vir- 
ginia and North Carolina. Another branch, the Tusca- 
roras, dwelt on the head-waters of the Roanoke River, 
and still other branches on the Susquehanna, in Pennsyl- 
vania, and on both the north and south shores of Lakes 
Ontario and Erie. 

Lying south of the Algonkins and Iroquoians were 
the tribes of the Chata-Muskoki family in the present 
States of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama ?.nd Georgia. 
To this stock belong the Creeks, Chickasaws, Choctaws 
and Seminoles. 

The watershed of the Mississippi was largely in pos- 
session of the Dakotas or Sioux, those intrepid plainsmen 
who have ever viewed the encroachments of the whites 
with a jealous eye and who have more than once on the 
field of battle disputed their right to advance westward. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



81 



Small bands of Sioux have also been found in Virginia 
and near the mouth of the Mississippi. 

The Caddoes and Kiowas are two smaller stocks. The 
tribes of the former were scattered irregularly from the 
Middle Missouri River to the Gulf of Mexico, while the 
latter lived in the upper basin of the Canadian branch of 
the Arkansas River. 

The great Uto-Aztecan family next claims our atten- 
tion. Tribes speaking dialects of this language have been 
found as far north as the Columbia River and as far 
south as the Isthmus of Panama. This family is divided 
into three branches : the Shoshonean, or northern ; the 
Sonoran, or middle, and the Nahuan, or southern. With- 
in this family are found the widest degrees of culture, 
the Diggers, the lowest Indians in North America, and 
the Aztecs, one of the most accomplished tribes, belong- 
ing to it. Among the tribes connected with this stock 
whose names will be mentioned on the pages of this 
work are the Toltecs, Aztecs, Chichimecs, Tezcucans and 
Tlascalans. 

Tribes of the great Mayan family inhabited the 
greater portion of Central America. Of these are the 
Mayas of Yucatan, the Tzendals of Chiapas, the Cak- 
chiquels and Quiches of Guatemala and the Lancandons 
on the Rio Lancandon. An outlying colony, the Huas- 
tecs, are also found in Mexico, on the Rio Panuco, north 
of Vera Cruz. The Mayas were the most enterprising 
of all the peoples of antiquity and built the forest-grown 
cities of Central America and Yucatan. 

Lying between the Uto-Aztecan and Mayan tribes, or 
occupying territory among them, are such stocks as the 
Otomies, -Tarascos, Totonacs, Zapotecs, Miztecs, Zoques, 
Mixes and Chontals. These tribes, or some of them, are 
sometimes classed with one or the other of the great 



82 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



peoples just mentioned, the Nahuas and Mayas, but 
Brinton gives them independent positions. 

Passing over the Isthmian tribes, who are of little 
importance to us in this consideration, we enter the pres- 
ent territory of the United States of Colombia. Here 
originally dwelt the Chibchas, or Muyscas, a race of high 
culture, whose capital was in the vicinity of Bogota. The 
Chibchas were skillful in the working of metals. 

The Carib stock was extensively distributed in the 
southern continent, inhabiting, on the mainland, the ter- 
ritory between the Essequibo River and the Gulf of 
Maracaibo. At the Discovery dialects of this stock were 
also found on the Lesser Antilles and the Carriby Islands. 

South of the Caribs lay the tribes of the Orinoco and 
its affluents. Father Gilii, over a century ago, grouped 
them into nine stocks, the Carib, Saliva, Maipure, Oto- 
maca, Guama, Guayba, Jaruri, Guarauna and Aruaca, 
but Alexander Humboldt, after naming and locating i85 
of these tribes, renounced as hopeless any attempt to 
classify them linguistically. 

The tribes on the upper Amazon and its tributaries 
Hervas classifies into sixteen stocks. This classification 
Brinton, however, rejects, and says: "No portion of the 
linguistic field of South America offers greater confusion 
than that of the western Amazonian region." — American 
Race, p. 278. 

Of all the native languages of South America, the 
Arawack is the most widely disseminated. Tribes of this 
stock are scattered from the head-waters of the river 
Paraguay northward to the Goajiros Peninsula, the most 
northerly point on the southern continent. Beth the 
Greater and Lesser Antilles, with the Bahamas, were 
originally inhabited by tribes of this stock. 

The Tupis are found in Brazil from the Amazon on 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



83 



the north to Uruguay on the south and from Bolivia 
on the west to the Atlantic on the cast. Brinton men- 




FIGURE 4. 



tions fcrty-one tribes who belong to this stock. 

Adjacent to the Tupis on the east are the Tapuyas, 



8 4 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



who are located between south latitude 5 degrees and 
south latitude 20 degrees, from north to south, and from 
the Schingu River on the west to the Atlantic Ocean on 
the east. This stock, which is one of the most extensive 
in South America, contains twenty-two known tribes. 

That vast region lying south of the dividing upland 
which separates the southern watershed of the Amazon 
from the watershed of the Rio de la Plata, is the home 
of a number of wild and independent stocks. For con- 
venience this region is divided into three divisions : the 
Gran Chaco, or northern ; the Pampean and Araucanian, 
or middle, and the Patagonian and Fuegian, or southern. 
Brinton mentions the names of five stocks in the Gran 
Chaco, one in the Pampean and three in the Patagonian 
region. 

Directing our attention now to the tribes on the 
Pacific Coast, we find the Canaris in the region around 
the Gulf of Guayaquil, and the Yuncas, or Chimus, in the 
vicinity of the present city of Truxillo. Both of these 
tribes were skillful artificers, and to the Yuncas is as- 
cribed one of the most noted of the ruins in Peru, Gran 
Chimu. 

\ In Peru, proper, we find two great families, the 
Aymara and the Quichua. Some hold that they are 
related, others that they are independent. The first can, 
probably, claim the longer residence in this region, and 
to them are undoubtedly due the ancient monuments of 
the first epoch of Peruvian history. To the Ouichuas be- 
longed the Incas, to whom are ascribed the cities of the 
later epoch of Peruvian history. The Ouichuas inhabited 
a territory stretching from 3 degrees north of the equa- 
tor to 32 degrees south of the equator, and reaching from 
the Pacific Coast some hundred miles into the interior. 
The Aymaras dwelt south and east of the Quichuas upon 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



85 



the plateau and western slopes cf the Andes and from 
south latitude 15 degrees to 20 degrees. 

The foregoing descriptions, while very brief, will be 
sufficient, I believe, to give the reader some idea of the 
location of those tribes whose names will be mentioned 
in this book. I recommend the reading of Brinton's ex- 
cellent and comprehensive work, "The American Race," 
for a fuller description of these tribes and nations. 

THE RUINS OF AMERICA. 

The American archaeological field may be divided, for 
convenience, into six sections : the Mississippi and Ohio 
Valleys and adjacent territory; the southwestern part of 
the United States, comprising adjacent portions of Utah, 
Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona ; Mexico ; Central 
America; the United States of Colombia, and Peru.. Al- 
though in other parts of the continent ancient tribes have 
left remains, it was in these that aboriginal American art 
reached the highest stages of its development. 

Antiquities of the Mound Builders. 

The remains of the Mound Builders are found chiefly 
in the valleys of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers and 
their tributaries, with a number in the Southeastern 
States. Yet, while this may be called the territory proper 
of this people, their remains have been found as far 
west as British Columbia and as far east as the Atlantic 
Coast. The greatest number of mounds is found in the 
State of Ohio, which has ten thousand of them. New 
York has 250. And, in an area of fifty square miles on 
the borders of the States cf Illinois and Iowa, twenty- 
five hundred mounds have been counted, to say nothing 
of inclosures. 

Squier and Davis, who in 1845-47 excavated more 



86 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



than two hundred of the mounds, and who published the 
account of their explorations in their well-known work, 
"Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley," classify 
these works, according to their probable purposes, as 
follows : 



As chief among the defensive inclosures may be 
mentioned Fort Ancient in Warren County, Ohio. It 
is situated upon a bluff, about three hundred feet high, 
on the east bank of the Little Miami. The wall ranges 
in height from three or four to nineteen feet and is 
from twenty-five to seventy feet wide at the base. It is 
made of earth and rough stones and incloses an area of 
about eighty acres, though the wall itself, on account of 
its windings, is about three and a half miles in length. 
The dirt composing the wall was obtained from the 
inside, thus forming an internal trench or moat. 1 The 
fortress at Bourneville, Ohio, twelve miles from Chilli- 
cothe, is also worthy of notice. As is generally, if not 
always, the case with defensive inclosures, it crowns the 
summit of a steep hill. Its walls are of unworked stones 
thrown together and are more than two miles in length. 
Three entrances are still to be made out, and these are 
defended with mounds. In a number of places, especially 
near the entrances, the walls show the action of fierce 
fires. The territory inclosed is given by MacLean as 140 
acres. 2 Fort Hill, another of Ohio's ancient monument-, 
is in Highland County on an eminence overlooking Paint 
Creek. The walls are composed of mingled earth and 
stone, are from four to six feet high by thirty-five feet 



1 "American Archaeology." pp. 125, 126. 

2 "The Mound Builders," p. 23. "Prehistoric America," p. 89. 




CUMORAH REVISITED 



87 



, thick and inclose an area of in acres. The hill from 
which it rises is said to be five hundred feet high and the 
wall over a mile and a half in length. 1 

A number of earthworks, because of their form and 
location, are supposed to have been sacred inclosures. 
The walls are usually circular or square, the circular 
works having nearly a uniform diameter of from 250 to 
300 feet. The reasons given for classifying them as 
sacred inclosures are: First, they are of smaller dimen- 
sions ; secondly, the ditches are on the inner side of the 
embankment ; thirdly, "altars" are found within them ; 
and, fourthly, they are more often found on the river 
bottoms, frequently overlooked by adjacent heights. 
However, all archaeologists do not agree that these works 
were for sacred purposes. Prof. Cyrus Thomas ("Amer- 
ican Archaeology," p. 131) says: "Although this view has 
been accepted by numerous authors, it does not appear to 
be founded on any valid reason. The more reasonable 
conclusion which is generally accepted at the present day 
is that they have been fortified villages. Lewis H. Mor- 
gan suggested that where the square and the circle were 
combined, the former surrounded the village, while the 
latter, which is often without a trench, was a substitute 
for a fence about the garden in which the villagers culti- 
vated their maize, beans, squashes and tobacco." 

The mounds of sacrifice, or "altar mounds," are 
found at various points throughout the country. The 
distinguishing feature about them, and that which gives 
them their name, is an altar, or hearth, made of clay or 
stone found at the base resting on the original surface. 
These altars are of different shapes, round, elliptical, 
square or oblong, and in size range from two to fifty feet 



1 "Prehistoric America," p. 89. 



88 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



by twelve or fifteen, the average dimensions being from 
five to eight. Upon excavation these altars have been 
found to contain calcined human bones, and implements 
and trinkets of various kinds, such as carved stones, 
mica ornaments, copper bracelets, discs and tubes, shell 
beads, pottery, spearheads and the like. It is very prob- 
able that these altars, instead of being for sacrifice, were 
for the purpose of cremating the dead, or were the beds 
where victims were burned at the stake, as they were 
used for this purpose after the coming of the whites. 
The mound group at Mound City, Ohio, three miles 
north of Chillicothe, on the Scioto River, contains a 
number of these so-called altar mounds. One of them 
is ninety feet in diameter at the base by seven and one- 
half feet high. The altar was ten by eight feet in dimen- 
sions at the base and six by four at the top, being 
eighteen inches high. The dip of its concave surface 
was nine inches. The hollow contained a deposit of 
ashes three inches thick and a few shell and pearl beads. 1 
Of so-called temple mounds, we have those at Mari- 
etta, Newark and Portsmouth, Ohio ; Cahokia, Illinois, 
and Seltzertown, Mississippi. One of the temple mounds 
at Marietta is 10 feet high, 188 feet long and 132 feet 
wide. Leading up to its summit are four graded ascents, 
midway upon each side, each being sixty feet long by 
twenty-five wide. 2 The Cahokia mound was by far the 
largest and has been called the "monarch of all the 
mounds." It was located within a group of about sixty 
others and was in the form of a parallelogram, being 
720 by 560 feet at the base and ninety feet high, trun- 
cated at the top. The dimensions of its truncated sum- 
mit were 310 by 146 feet. On its top was a conical 



1 "The Mound Builders," p. 48. 

2 "The Mound Builders," p. 45. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



89 



mound, ten feet high, which, upon excavation, was found 
to contain human bones, pieces of flint and fragments of 
pottery. 1 The great mound at Seltzertown is almost as 
large as was that at Cahokia. In its form it is a paral- 
lelogram, being six hundred by four hundred feet at the 
base and forty feet high. The platform is reached by a 
flight of steps and is about three acres in area. From 
the summit rise three conical mounds, the largest of 
which is forty feet high, giving the entire structure an 
altitude of eighty feet. The northern face of the mound 
is strengthened by a wall of sun-dried bricks two feet 
thick, many of which still retain the finger-marks of the 
builders. 2 The temple mounds are all truncated and 
many of them are terraced. 

The great mound at Grave Creek, West Virginia, 
ranks among the most important of the mounds of sepul- 
ture. It is one thousand feet in circumference at the base 
and seventy feet high. Three chambers were found in it, 
two at the base, the other thirty feet above. The upper 
chamber contained one body ; one of the lower chambers 
two — one of a male, the other of a female. With these 
remains were also found mica ornaments, shell collars, 
copper bracelets and fragments of carved stone. The 
third chamber contained ten skeletons in a squatting pos- 
ture, supposed to have been victims immolated in honor 
cf the chief. The walls and ceilings were made of 
beams, which, decaying away, let the superimposed mass 
of earth and stones down upon the skeletons. 3 A se- 
pulchral mound at New Madrid, Missouri, upon explora- 
tion, was found to be 900 feet in circumference at 
its base and 570 at its summit. In its interior was found 



1 "Prehistoric America," p. 103. 

2 "Prehistoric America," pp. 103, 104. 

3 "Prehistoric America," p. 116. 



90 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



a chamber formed of elm or cypress poles set together 
like the rafters of a house, the ends being tied together 
with reeds. This chamber was coated both inside and 
out with a coating of marl, the inside coating being care- 
fully smoothed and painted with red ochre. Excavations 
yielded syenite discs, numerous pieces of pottery and one 
vessel inclosing a human skull which could not be re- 
moved. 1 

The great Miamisburg mound, in Ohio, is classed by 
MacLean among the mounds of observation. It is situ- 
ated on a high hill, just east of the Great Miami, and 
has a commanding view of the valley. It is 852 feet in 
circumference by sixty-eight in height. A beacon light 
displayed from its summit could easily be seen from the 
high mound near Elk Creek, in Butler County, and from 
there warning could be given to all the inclosures in that 
part of the State. 2 Lookout Mountain, near Circleville, 
Ohio, is also supposed to be a mound of observation. 

There is still another class of mounds which remain 
to be mentioned, those that resemble animals, birds and 
the human figure and which are known as efBgy mounds. 
These abound in the State of Wisconsin, and have also 
been found elsewhere. Their purpose was evidently 
totemic. Of this class I mention two, the Great Serpent 
and the Great Elephant. The former is found in Adams 
County, Ohio, on a hill overlooking Brush Creek. Its 
coils are seven hundred feet long and in its mouth it has 
an egg-shaped mound whose major axis is 160 feet. 3 
The latter is found in Grant County, Wisconsin, eight 
miles from the mouth of the Wisconsin River, and is 135 

1 "Prehistoric America," p. 104. 

2 "The Mound Builders," p. 59. 

3 "Prehistoric America," p. 126. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



91 



feet long by sixty broad at the broadest part. 1 Prof. 
Cyrus Thomas, who explored it in 1884 under the di- 
rection of the Smithsonian Institution, declares that it 
was intended to represent a bear, the proboscis being 
made by drifting sand. 

Other works of the Mound Builders might be men- 
tioned, but as this is not intended to be a work of de- 
scriptive archaeology, I forbear, referring the reader to 
the authors quoted from and referred to for further 
information concerning the mounds. 

Antiquities of the Cliff Dive Hers. 

The country of the Cliff Dwellers, in the southwest- 
ern part of the United States, affords much that is inter- 
esting to the antiquarian. Here, in a region of mountain 
ranges and arid deserts, with an occasional fertile valley, 
a numerous population once lived and developed a stage 
of culture considerably beyond that of the wild tribes of 
North America. 

Mr. G. Nordenskiold classifies the works of this 
people geographically as follows : ( 1 ) The ruins on the 
upper course of the Colorado and its tributaries. (2) 
The ruins on the Rio Grande and its tributaries. And 
(3) the ruins on the Gila and its tributaries. 

Holmes classifies these works topographically as : ( 1 ) 
Settlements in the valleys and on the plains. (2) Settle- 
ments on the high plateaus or mesas. (3) Cliff dwell- 
ings. And (4) cave dwellings. 

The villages or settlements found in the valleys or on 
the plains and mesas consist of pueblos made of stone 
or adobe laid in clay or mud and forming parallelograms 
or circles laid out, where the ground permits, with great 



1 "Prehistoric America/' p. 125. 



Q2 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



regularity. The pueblos were, in fact, colossal com- 
munal houses, built of several stories facing an inclosed 
area, and receding in the form of steps on the inside, 
but with the outer walls perpendicular. A few of the 
pueblos are inhabited to-day, but some of them were 
deserted as far back as 1540, when Coronado visited 
them. This class of ruins is found chiefly in the drain- 
age area of the San Juan and in or along the valleys of 
the M.ancos, Las Animas and Rio de la Plata, at the 
Aztec Springs in Montezuma Valley, in the McElmo and 
Hovenweep Canyons and on the wild plateau around the 
Grand Canyon. 

The cave dwellings occur chiefly on the west side of 
the Rio Grande from Santa Clara to Cochiti, a distance 
of about seventy-five miles, and in the San Juan Valley, 
especially above the mouth of the Rio Mancos. In the 
former section the cliffs, of a yellow volcanic tufa of 
coarse texture, rise to the height of from fifty to two 
hundred feet above the sloping debris which extends 
downward to the bottom of the canyons. It was in the 
lower part of these perpendicular cliffs that the ancient 
inhabitants hollowed out their places of dwelling. These 
caves were formed by first cutting in the face of the rock 
the door to the depth of about a foot, and then hollowing 
out the room, which was generally oval or irregularly 
rounded, about twelve feet in diameter, and with the ceil- 
ing cnly sufficiently high to permit a full-grown person 
to stand upright. Along the walls, on the inside, niches 
and recesses were dug which served as places in which 
to store the articles of domestic use. The outside walls 
were sometimes pierced with irregular holes which prob- 
ably served for windows. In some instances the outer 
walls were artificial and made of stone. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



95 



The cliff dwellings are found at various points 
throughout the Rio Colorado basin and in the Grand 
and Mancos Canyons, besides in various other localities 
in the Southwest. They are constructed on the shelves 
and in the recesses of the cliffs and at their base. They 
are usually circular or rectangular in shape and are made 
of stone and mortar. In many of them even wooden 
beams and articles, textile fabrics and bone implements 
are well preserved. It is claimed that in the Rio Mancos 
region alone there are as many as five hundred of these 
dwellings. 1 

Antiquities of the Mexicans. 

Passing southward into Mexico, we come to a group 
of ruins known as the Casas Grandes, in the State of 
Chihuahua. These ruins consist of the remains of walls 
made of sun-dried blocks of mud and gravel and varying 
in thickness from sixteen inches to four feet. The build- 
ings were several stories in height, the central portions 
being higher than the outer. Holes, rectangular, round 
and oval in shape, were cut through the walls, and were 
evidently for ventilation and the admission of light. 2 

In the State of Zacatecas, six miles from the present 
town of Villanueva, are found a group of ruins known 
to archaeologists as Quemada. They are situated upon a 
plateau a half mile in length by from two hundred to 
five hundred yards in width and guarded at the approach- 
able points by stone walls. Where the interior surface 
is uneven it is formed into terraces by walls of solid 
masonry. These terraces originally supported numerous 
edifices the remains of which are still to be made out. 
One cf the most important of the monuments at Que- 



1 "American Archaeology," pp. 203-220. 

2 "American Archaeology," pp. 223-229. 



9 6 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



mada is a pyramid thirty-six feet square by nineteen feet 
high, built with six successive stages or steps. The 
material out of which all these works are constructed is 
chiefly gray porphyry made into undressed slabs three or 
four inches thick and laid in reddish clay mortar, mixed 
with grass or straw. 1 

On the site of the present unimportant town of Tula, 
fifty or sixty miles north of the City of Mexico, there 
formerly existed the capital of the Toltecs, which, 
according to tradition, was variously known as Tula, 
Tulla, Tulha, Tulan, Tolan or Tollan. This ancient city 
spread over a plain crossed by a muddy river, which 
still flows round the base of Mount Coatepetl. But few 
antiquities have, however, been found in this locality. 
Among these are fragments of sculptured columns carved 
to represent a feathered serpent. Charnay also discov- 
ered in tumuli near the present town the foundations of 
two ancient dwellings, one of which consisted of rooms, 
cisterns, corridors and stairways. Other ruins of build- 
ings and pyramids were also found. 2 

About twenty-five miles northeast of the City of 
[Mexico stand the ruins of Teotihuacan, the "City of the 
Gods." This city is easily at the head of all the ancient 
cities of Mexico in the magnitude of its ruins and the 
evidences it bears of population and antiquity. Its prin- 
cipal works are the Pyramids of the Sun and Moon, the 
Citadel and the "Pathway of the Dead." The Pyramid 
of the Sun is a colossal mound with a square base meas- 
uring seven hundred feet on a side and towering upward 
to an altitude of 180 feet. The Pyramid of the Moon is 
smaller, measuring nearly five hundred feet on a side and 
is of proportional height. The Citadel is a rectangular 



1 "American Archaeology," p. 251. 

2 "American Archaeology," pp. 255-257, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



99 



inclosure 1,350 by 1,400 feet in width and length and 
surrounded by walls varying from 100 to 180 feet in 
width and from 10 to 20 feet high. The Pathway of the 
Dead is described by Thomas as follows : "The latter, a 
depressed way varying from two to three hundred feet 
in width, extends southward a distance of over two miles, 
and is flanked on either side by an almost unbroken series 
of mounds and terraces ranging in height from ten to 
thirty feet." — American Archaeology, p. 260. Teotihua- 
can is attributed by most writers to pre-Aztecan times. 1 

At Cholula the remains of a great square pyramid are 
still to be seen. The size ot this pyramid is variously 
given, Bandelier ascribing to it a perimeter at the base 
of 7,740 feet and a height of 165 feet. Tradition says 
that it is of pre-Aztecan origin, and that it was formerly 
surmounted by a temple to Quetzalcoatl. 

Thirty miles almost straight east of the capital of the 
State of Oajaca lie the remains of the ancient Zapotec 
capital, Mitla. Its original name was Tiobaa, or Yobaa, 
"the place of tombs," and its present name in the Aztec 
tongue signifies the "dwelling of the dead." The region 
in which these remains are found is one of the most 
desolate in southern Mexico, being a high, narrow valley 
surrounded by bare hills and with a soil of fine powdery 
sand in which nothing grows save a few scattered pita- 
hayas. A stream flows through the valley between 
parched and shadeless banks which becomes a torrent in 
the rainy season. The songs of birds are never heard 
and the fragrance of flowers is never breathed among 
the desolate ruins, but venomous spiders and scorpions 
abound. The number of original structures has been 
different stated by different explorers according to 



1 "American Archaeology," pp. 259-263. 

2 "American Archaeology," p. 267. 



100 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



their own peculiar methods of counting. The most im- 
portant are the temples, or palaces, four in number, made 
of stones dressed with regularity, and with well-cut 
joints, faultless bends and edges of unequaled sharp- 
ness. The mosaics at Mitla are some of the finest that 
are to be found among the ruins of ancient America. A 
characteristic and distinguishing feature of the architec- 
ture of this city is a number of large stone columns run- 
ning through the middle of some of the rooms and prob- 
ably intended as supports for the roofs. These ruins 
were probably built at an early period of Zapotec civili- 
zation, and continued the chief center of that people 
down to a century or two before the Conquest, to a dis- 
astrous conflict between the Zapotecs and Aztecs. 1 

Antiquities of Central America. 

Hidden away in the tropical forest of the State of 
Chiapas in Central America lie the ancient ruins of Oto- 
lum or Palenque. These ruins are by far the grandest 
in America, and are very probably among the oldest. 
The city is situated on both sides of a branch of the 
Usumacinta River, about seven miles southwest of Santo 
Domingo and sixty-five miles northeast of San Chris- 
toval, the State capital, and covers an area Of, probably, 
not more than a mile square, although it has been claimed 
that it stretches along the stream for several leagues. 
Among the best-preserved ruins are those of the Palace 
and of the Temples of the Three Tablets, of the Bas 
Reliefs, of the Cross and of the Sun. The Palace is the 
most important of the remaining edifices of Palenque 
and stands upon a pyramid forty feet high and 310 by 
260 feet long and broad at the base, The interior of the 



1 "American Archaeology," pp. 268-273. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



101 




102 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



pyramid is formed of earth, but the exterior is a cover- 
ing of stone slabs. A flight of steps leads up to the 
summit, upon which stands the principal building, form- 
ing a quadrilateral of 228 feet by 180. The walls of the 
Palace are made of rubble, two or three feet thick, and 
are coated both inside and out with a very durable stucco 
painted red or blue, black or white. The edifice faces 
the east and has fourteen entrances, nine feet wide, sepa- 
rated by pillars ornamented with carved figures. On the 
inside there are galleries running around a court, with 
rooms decorated with granite bas-reliefs carved with 
grotesque figures some thirteen feet high. The rooms 
are connected by corridors. The roof is surmounted by 
a peculiarly shaped cone. The Temple of the Three 
Tablets also stands upon a mound and is 76 feet long, 
25 wide and 35 high. The Temple of the Cross is de- 
scribed as 50 feet long, 31 feet wide and 40 feet high. 
And the Temple of the Sun is said to be 28 feet wide by 
38 feet long. The last two structures, like the former, 
are built upon stone-faced pyramids and are decorated 
with bas-reliefs. The dates assigned for the erection of 
Palenque have varied from before the flood to a few 
centuries before the Spanish Conquest. 1 

One of the most important of the ancient cities of 
Yucatan is Uxmal, the remains of which lie some thirty- 
five or forty miles south of Merida, the present capital. 
The most important of the ruins cover an area of not 
more than half a mile square and consist of some five 
or six buildings, mounted as usual upon pyramids, a 
tennis court and three or four mounds, whose edifices, 
if they ever existed, have entirely disappeared. One of 
the buildings is the Casa del Gobernador, or Governor's 

1 "Prehistoric America," p. 319, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



103 



House. It is reared on a colossal terrace, and "is the 
most extensive, best known and most magnificent monu- 
ment of Central America." This house is 325 feet long 
by forty broad, and has a promenade thirty feet wide 
running entirely around it. The height from the base 
to its level top is twenty-six feet, nearly the whole of the 
upper half of which is a profusely ornamented frieze 
running entirely around the building, a distance of 725 
feet. "This elaborate ornamentation, which is all in 
wrought stone, consists of a checkered or lattice back- 
ground; Greek frets, series of bars terminating with 
serpent heads, the interspaces being covered with hiero- 
glyphs ; human figures with immense head-dresses over 
the doorways (the human figures have all been broken 
away) ; and an upper line of great stone masks, with 
long, curved, proboscis-like noses." — American Archae- 
ology, p. 291. This edifice is divided lengthwise, by a 
wall running through the middle, into two series of 
rooms. It is made of rubble and gray limestone, the 
latter forming the facings and the former filling up the 
interior. The limestone is cut into large square blocks 
laid with precision and are in most instances plain. The 
rear wall is nine feet thick and without openings, except 
near the ends, where there are recesses, entrance being 
gained from the front. Other structures of interest to 
archaeologists are the Nunnery, the Temple of the Dwarf 
or Magician and the House of the Pigeons. 1 

Chichen Itza, the most important ruins in eastern 
Yucatan, lies twenty miles west of the present city of 
Valladolid, in the midst of a forest-covered plain. Its 
name signifies "The Mouth of the Well of the Itzas," 
and was probably given on account of two great natural 

1 "American Archaeology," pp. 288-295. 



104 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



wells or cenotes which are found within its area. The 
principal ruins cover a territory considerably less than a 
mile square and consist of about a half-dozen important 
structures, with a number of others of less importance 
that have not been explored. These structures have been 
named by archaeologists so that they may be distinguished 
from one another, but it does not follow that they have 
been correctly named. We have the Nun's Palace, the 
Caracol or Tower, the Castillo or Castle, the Gymnasium 
and the House of the Tigers. The Castillo is the most 
important of these edifices. It consists of a block-like 
superstructure built upon the summit of a steep, terraced 
pyramid seventy-five or eighty feet high. The sides of 
this pyramid are divided into nine steps or terraces, and 
running up each of the sides from bottom to top is a 
broad stone stairway. At least one of these stairways is 
bordered with balustrades carved to represent serpents 
and ending at the bottom in huge serpent heads with 
open mouths and protruding tongues. The temple itself 
is of usual form ; a front entry extends its whole length 
and is interrupted by two columns, placed at equal dis- 
tances supporting a wooden lintel and carved to repre- 
sent feathered serpents with the heads bent outward at 
the base. Columns of the same form are also found in 
the House of the Tigers, and they are so similar to those 
discovered at Tula, mentioned before, that there is little 
doubt that their sculptors were governed by the same 
religious ideas and motives. The chief sculptures in the 
Castle are those of human form, elaborately costumed, 
stern featured and represented, in some instances, with 
long, full beards. 1 

The ruins of Tikal are found about twenty miles 



"American Archaeology," pp. 296-302. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



105 



northeast of Peten, a modern town in the present State 
of Peten. One of the most important of the edifices is 
a pyramid which, with its three-storied temple, measured, 
according to Maudsley, the English explorer, nearly three 
hundred feet high, probably on the slope. The chief 
features of Tikal architecture which have impressed 
archaeologists the most are its native wood carving, 
which is the best, so far as is known, in America ; an 




CASA COLORADO, CHICHEN ITZA. 

enormous stone serpent, arched and ornamented, holding 
between its open jaws a human figure with lofty head- 
dress ; an erect human figure with lance and shield ; and 
several columns of beautifully carved hieroglyphics 
closely resembling those at Palenque and easily recog- 
nized as day symbols with numerals attached. 1 

On the Rio Motagua, in eastern Guatemala, lie the 
celebrated ruins of Quirigua. These ruins consist of a 
number of square or oblong mounds and terraces rang- 
ing from six to forty feet in height, some standing in 
isolated positions, others clustered together in groups. 



1 "American Archaeology," p. 303. 



io6 CUMORAH REVISITED 

Like tne pyramids in other localities in Central America, 
these are faced with worked stone and their summits 
reached by flights of stone steps. With these pyramids 
are also found thirteen or more monoliths arranged 
irregularly around courts or plazas. Six of these mono- 
liths are stone columns, measuring from three to five feet 
square and from fourteen to twenty feet high, and five 
are carved to represent turtles, armadillos or similar 
animals. The columns are usually carved on both front 
and back sides with a human figure standing upright and 
full-faced in a stiff and conventional attitude. The sides 
are covered with hieroglyphics like those at Palenque 
and Tikal. 1 

The ancient city of Copan lies on the Copan River in 
Honduras some twenty-five or thirty miles directly south 
of Quirigua. While the ruins extend along the river for 
a distance of two miles, the most important structures 
are included in an area of 900 by 1,600 feet. Stretching 
along the river from north to south is a stone wall, which 
at the time of Stephens' visit was 624 feet in length and 
from sixty to ninety feet high, in some places fallen, in 
others entire. This wall seems to have formed one of 
the sides of the elevated foundation of a great edifice 
whose length, running east and west, was 809 feet. The 
wall along the river is perpendicular, but the other sides 
of the foundation are sloping. The original height of 
the terrace platform above the surface of the ground is 
supposed to have been about seventy feet. This massive 
structure is built of cut stone in blocks a foot and a half 
wide by three to six feet long, and required, it is esti- 
mated, about twenty-six million cubic feet in its construc- 
tion. On the platform are two sunken courts about 



1 "American Archaeology," pp. 303, 304. 



CUM OR ATI REVISITED 



107 



thirty feet below the surface, one of which is 90 by 144 
ieet in dimensions, the other still larger. These courts 
are reached by flights of stone steps. On the platform be- 
tween these sunken courts rises a pyramid to the height 
of 122 feet on the slope, in steps or stages each six 
feet high and nine feet wide. In addition to this struc- 
ture, carved obelisks, statues and idols, with a number of 
stone altars, are also to be seen. There are fourteen of 
the obelisks, most of them standing and in good preserva- 
tion. In the center of the front side of these obelisks is 
a human face, usually with benign and peaceful counte- 
nance, around which appears a profuse mass of orna- 
mentation. On the sides are columns of hieroglyphics 
like those at Palenque. The altars resemble those at 
Quirigua. 1 

This completes our description of the ruins of Mexico 
and Central America. It has of necessity been brief, but 
has been, we believe, sufficiently comprehensive to give 
the reader some idea of those ancient cities, many of 
which the Mormons claim were built by Jaredite and 
Nephite workmen. Others of sufficient importance to 
deserve mention are Zape, Xochicalco, Tusapan, Mis- 
antla and Monte Alban in Mexico ; Ococingo in Chia- 
pas ; Ake, Izamal, Kabah, Labna and Tuloom in Yuca- 
tan, and Utatlan in Guatemala. 

Antiquities of the Muyscas. 

In the region of Bogota, United States of Colombia, 
there formerly lived an enterprising people known to us 
as the Chibchas or Muyscas. Their territory was only 
forty-five leagues long by from twelve to fifteen wide, 
and yet in this comparatively small region they developed 



1 "Native Races," Vol. IV., pp. 77-105 



io8 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



a culture and maintained their independence against their 
powerful neighbors. Nadaillac sums up the chief fea- 
tures of their culture in the following: "Less advanced s 
perhaps, than the Aztecs or the Peruvians, the Chibchas 
were yet able to lay out and pave roads, to span their 
watercourses w T ith bridges, to build temples with columns 
to their gods, to carve statues, to engrave figures on 
stone, to weave and dye cotton and wool, to adorn their 
woven tissues with varied patterns, and to work in wood, 
stone and the metals. Their pottery resembled that of 
other people of America; their vessels are generally 
formed of three superposed layers ; the central layer is 
black, whilst the internal and external ones are of finer 
earth and lighter color. The ornaments of the Chibchas 
were collars made of shells which came from the coasts 
of the Pacific, more than two hundred leagues off ; gold, 
stone and silver pendants, pearls and emeralds. Their 
wealth was considerable, and chroniclers relate that in 
the first few months succeeding the conquest the con- 
quistadors collected spoil of which the value exceeded 
thirty million francs. If these figures are not exagger- 
ated, they are really enormous for the time and country." 
— Prehistoric America, pp. 459, 460. 

The chief town of the Muyscas was Sogomuxi, which 
at an early date was destroyed by the Spaniard, Quesada. 
It is thought to have stood in the vicinity of Tunja, in 
the State of Boyaca, and here still stand thirteen columns 
of stone from twelve to fifteen feet high, and a little 
farther off, near some extensive ruins, stand nineteen 
others which are not so tall, while along the coast for 
two miles are scattered numerous carved stones, relics 
of the ancient civilization. 1 



"Prehistoric America," p„ 461. 



CUM ORAM REVISITED 



109 



Antiquities of the Peruvians. 

All of the western coast of South America, from the 
modern city of Truxillo southward to Tumbez, a distance 
of more than 625 miles, belonged, according to Garci- 
lasso de la Vega, to the Chimus. Tradition says-that this 
people came from the sea and that, after conquering the 
wild tribes, they began a career of industry and civiliza- 
tion. They were early conquered by the Incas and re- 
mained subject to them, though not willingly, until the 
Spanish Conquest. Their capital was Gran Chimu, in 
the vicinity of the present town of Truxillo. Here its 
ruins extend over a territory nearly fifteen miles long by 
five and a half wide and consist of the remains of mas- 
sive walls, huacas, palaces, aqueducts, reservoirs and 
granaries, some in a fair state of preservation. One of 
the most important of the structures is the huaca, or 
venerated structure, of Obispo. It is built of a con- 
glomerate of stone and clay and is 150 feet high, 580 
feet square at the base, and covers an area of eight acres. 
Some of the huacas were used for burial purposes. The 
palace, which rises from a mound of successive terraces, 
includes a number of buildings, irregularly arranged, 
built of adobe. The interior is divided up into a series 
of halls, rooms, corridors and vaulted crypts, one of the 
rooms being fifty-two feet wide and its length exceeding 
one hundred. It is ornamented with stucco-work, fine 
arabesques and Greek frets, the latter a characteristic 
feature of Peruvian ornamentation. The royal necrop- 
olis was not far from the palace, and excavations have 
laid bare walls of immense thickness and a stairway lead- 
ing to a number of vaulted chambers in which were 
found several dried-up mummies with their skulls painted 
red. The prison is an immense inclosure 320 feet by 240 



no 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



and 25 feet high. Within this inclosure forty-five cells 
have been found arranged in five rows and with no com- 
munication between them. A rare thing about these 
remains is that dwelling-houses have been made out. 1 

The ancient city of Pachacamac was situated on the 
Pacific Coast, twenty miles from Lima. The ruins are 
now in extreme decay, only a single burial-place remain- 
ing. Perhaps the best description that we have of this 
ancient city is that of Estete, a member of the expedition 
led by Pizarro. He claims that the town was large, and 
that near the temple stood a house, surrounded by five 
walls, called "The House of the Sun." At the time of 
his writing, the entire city was surrounded with a wall, 
with large doors opening through it, which was already 
in ruins, even at that time, in some places. The Castle 
rose from a rock five hundred feet above the level of the 
sea. The walls of this rock rose in four terraces, faced 
with adobes, painted red. Its platform covers several 
acres, and is covered by debris which once formed a 
number of important buildings. The temple faced the 
south, was well decorated and painted, and contained an 
inner sanctuary in which a wooden image of the Creator 
was kept. A mile and a half away still stand the ruins 
of the "Nun's Convent." 2 

At Cuzco, the structures are made of extremely hard 
rocks, such as diorite, porphyry and brown trachyte. 
These were carried by main force from the quarries of 
Anduhaylillas, twenty-two miles distant, the Peruvians 
having no beasts of burden. These materials were cut 
into great blocks, and were carefully squared and fitted 
together with mortise and tenon. No mortar, according 
to Squier, was used in the construction of any of these 



1 "Prehistoric America," p. 395. 

2 "Prehistoric America," pp. 392, 393. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



in 



buildings, the walls being kept in place by their own 
weight. At the time of the Conquest, the most important 
of the edifices of Cuzco was the Temple of the Sun, "the 
pride of the capital and the wonder of the empire." It 
was so enriched with the precious metal that it was given 
the name of "The Place of Gold." It consisted of one 
principal and several inferior buildings in the center of 
the city, all made of stone and encompassed with a wall. 
On the interior of the principal building, on the western 
side, was a golden representation of the sun from which 
emanated golden rays of light, while the walls and ceil- 
ings everywhere were encrusted with the golden metal. 
A golden frieze, or belt, encircled the whole edifice on 
the outside. Yet, notwithstanding all of this lavish adorn- 
ment, the roof of this temple was thatched with straw! 
Besides the Temple of the Sun, there were others dedi- 
cated to the moon, stars and other deities. Prescott says 
there were between three and four hundred of these. 1 

Lake Titicaca is twelve thousand feet above the level 
of the sea, and soundings have revealed a depth of 1,710 
feet. It is one hundred miles long and from fifty to 
seventy wide, and is dotted by a number of islands. The 
most important bears the name of the lake and is six 
miles long by three or four wide. This was the sacred 
island of the ancient Peruvians, and it was here that 
tradition says were born Manco Capac and Mama Oello. 
It is covered with ruins, the most important of which are 
the Palace of the Sun, the Convent and the Palace of the 
Incas. The island of Coati, two and a half miles long by 
three-quarters of a mile wide, six miles from Titicaca, 
was also a shrine of the Peruvians. As Titicaca was dedi- 
cated to the sun, so Coati was dedicated to the moon. 2 



1 "Prehistoric America," p. 410. "Conquest of Peru," Vol. I., pp. 8-10. 
8 "Prehistoric America," pp. 406-408. 



112 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



The ruins of the ancient city of Tiaghuanaco rise 
from the center of a basin twelve thousand feet above 
the level of the ocean, formed by two lakes, Titicaca and 
Aullagas, and overlooked by Mt. Illampu, the loftiest 
mountain in South America. This ancient city is of pre- 
Incan origin, and was evidently the seat of an important 
civilization. Here are found a number of colossal mono- 
liths, carved and ornamented with bas-reliefs. The struc- 
tures were built of stone, "red freestone, a slate-colored 
trachyte, and a very dark basalt" being the kinds, highly 
polished and laid one upon another with such precision 
that the joints are hardly perceptible. The most impor- 
tant of the buildings, which we shall not take the space 
to describe, are the Fortress, the Temple and the Hall of 
Justice. 1 

For a fuller description of the antiquities of Peru, I 
recommend the reading of the interesting chapter on 
them in Nadaillac's "Prehistoric America," to which I am 
indebted for most of the facts brought out in the last 
few pages. 

Mormons contend that the Book of Mormon must be 
of divine origin because it locates the ancient American 
cities in those very localities where they were after- 
wards found. On this point Apostle Orson Pratt writes : 
"In the Book of Mormon are given the names and loca- 
tions of numerous cities of great magnitude, which once 
flourished among the ancient nations of America. The 
northern portions ©f South America, and also Central 
America, were the most densely populated. Splendid 
edifices, palaces, towers, forts and cities were reared in 
all directions. A careful reader of that interesting book 
can trace the relative bearings and distances of many of 



"Prehistoric America," pp. 400-406. 



CUMCRAH REVISITED 



113 



these cities from each other, and, if acquainted with the 
present geographical features of the country, he can, by 
the descriptions given in that book, determine very nearly 
the precise spot of ground they once occupied. Now, 
since that invaluable book made its appearance in print, it 
is a remarkable fact that the mouldering ruins of many 
splendid edifices and towers, and magnificent cities of 
great extent, have been discovered by Catherwood and 
Stephens in the interior wilds of Central America, in the 
very region where the ancient cities described in the Book 
of Mormon were said to exist. Here, then, is certain and 
indisputable evidence that this illiterate youth — the trans- 
lator of the Book of Mormon — was inspired of God." — 
O. Pratt's Works, p. 278. 

But this claim can not be accepted for several reasons. 

In the first place, many of the ancient cities of Mexico 
and Central America were discovered long before the 
Book of Mormon appeared. Of these may be mentioned 
Copan, Utatlan, Chichen Itza, T'Ho, Tuloom, Palenque, 
Mitla, Cholula, Teotihucan and Mexico. Therefore the 
Book of Mormon, in placing the great centers of aborig- 
inal population in this region, simply stated what scien- 
tific men already knew years before it came out. Its 
fabricator evidently used this knowledge to good advan- 
tage in getting up his story. 

In the second place, the book has been with us seventy 
years, and more, and yet it has never rendered any assist- 
ance whatever to the archaeologist in making his discov- 
eries. It has never revealed the location of a single 
prehistoric city. The investigator who would depend 
upon it to trace the relative bearings and distances of the 
cities of Central America from each other would soon 
find himself bewildered. When brought to a practical 
test, this "invaluable book" fails at the very point where 



114 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



its defenders claim that it is accurate and reliable. If it 
is what its defenders assert it to be, why have they left 
the work of archaeological research wholly in the hands 
of uninspired men? Why have they not gone forth, Book 
of Mormon in hand, and located the ruined cities of Cen- 
tral America and thus proved its infallibility and inspira- 
tion ? 

In the third place, its geographical and topographical 
descriptions are so vague that there exists a difference of 
opinion among even the Mormons themselves on the loca- 
tion of many of the cities and places mentioned in the 
book. Although hundreds of cities, countries and places 
are mentioned, but few landmarks are given by which 
they may be located. While the author seems to have 
recognized the general shape of the central portion of the 
continent in the construction of his story, his topograph- 
ical and geographical descriptions are very vague and 
indefinite. The Isthmus of Panama is called "the narrow 
neck which led into the land northward" (Alma 30:3), 
and this seems to be the fixed star from which Mormon 
writers make all their geographical calculations. It is 
easy to understand that by the Land Xorthward and the 
Land Southward Xorth and South America are meant, 
and that by the Land of Many Waters the United States 
is intended, while the Land of Xephi is without doubt to 
be located somewhere on the west coast of South Amer- 
ica. But these are about all of the natural and political 
divisions whose locations can be made out by the descrip- 
tions given. On the location of other countries and places 
there is disagreement, conjecture and uncertainty, and 
this is admitted by the Josephite Committee on American 
Archaeology: "So all that can be done in the way of map- 
ping the lands and places of dwelling of this ancient race 
is by approximation and probabilities, in the main ; cer- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



ii5 



tainty as to fixed locality being the exception, while much 
must be left to mere theory." — Report, p. 7. This ad- 
mission places the Josephite Committee on American 
Archaeology in direct opposition to the Brighamite, Orson 
Pratt. 

TRADITIONAL HISTORY OF ANCIENT AMERICA. 

The Mound Builders. 

To the people who erected the mounds of the Missis- 
sippi and Ohio Valleys, archaeologists, for want of a 
better designation, have given the name "Mound Build- 
ers." This people possessed in all parts about the same 
degree of culture, which in no respect differed from that 
of the more advanced tribes of American Indians when 
first seen by the whites. 

Who were the Mound Builders? This question has 
probably provoked more guesses than any other in Amer- 
ican archaeology. Some have been certain that they were 
a people from Central America, who, after dwelling in 
the northern valleys for a long time, returned into Mexico 
as the Toltecs. Others have been satisfied to speak of 
them simply as a "lost race" without trying to account 
for either their origin or their disappearance. But of 
late, on account of the data gathered by the Smithsonian 
and other institutions, archaeologists have pretty generally 
settled down to the conclusion that they were tribes of 
American Indians and not a lost race of superior culture. 
The evidence of this is so strong that it is sheer folly 
any longer to deny it. 

The most important tradition which reaches back to 
pre-Columbian times is that preserved among the Del- 
awares. It was given to the world by the missionary 
Heckewelder, in 18 19, and was later confirmed by Brinton 
in his translation of the Delaware Walam Olum, or Red 



n6 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Score, though it was, without doubt, known to white men 
before. According to this tradition, the Ohio Valley was, 
in olden times, inhabited by the Alligewi, Talligewi, Tal- 
ligeu or Tallike, an enterprising and numerous race, who 
lived in communities and tilled the soil. It is stated that 
this people, after long occupying this region, were finally 
driven out by the combined forces of the Lenape and 
Hurons and forced to flee to the south. Name, location, 
tradition and language all agree in identifying this ex- 
pelled people with the Cherokees, who call themselves 
Tsalagi. 

The tradition, as given by Heckewelder, runs as fol- 
lows : "The Lenni Lenape (according to the tradition 
handed down to them by their ancestors) resided many 
hundred years ago in a very distant country in the west- 
ern part of the American continent. For some reason 
which I do not find accounted for, they determined on 
migrating to the eastward, and accordingly set out to- 
gether in a body. After a very long journey and many 
nights' encampment by the way, they at length arrived on 
the Namaesi-Sipu, where they fell in with the Mengwe, 
who had likewise emigrated from a distant country and 
had struck upon this river somewhat higher up. Their 
object was the same with that of the Delawares : they 
were proceeding on to the eastward until they should find 
a country that pleased them. The spies which the Lenape 
had sent forward for the purpose of reconnoitering had, 
long before their arrival, discovered that the country east 
of the Mississippi was inhabited by a very powerful 
nation, who had many large towns built on the great 
rivers flowing through their land. Those people (as I 
was told) called themselves Talligeu or Tallegewi. . . . 
Many wonderful things are told of this famous people. 
They are said to have been remarkably tall and stout ; and 



CUM ORAM REVISITED 



117 



there is a tradition that there were giants among them, 
people of much larger size than the tallest of the Lenape. 
It is related that they had built to themselves regular 
fortifications or intrenchments, from whence they would 
sally out, but were generally repulsed. I have seen many 
of the fortifications said to have been built by them, two 
of which in particular were remarkable. One of them 
was near the mouth of the river Huron, which empties 
itself into the lake St. Clair on the north side of 
that lake, at the distance of about twenty miles north- 
east of Detroit. This spot of ground was, in the year 
1776, owned and occupied by a Mr. Tucker. The 
other works, properly intrenchments, being walls or 
banks of earth regularly thrown up, with a deep 
ditch on the outside, were on the Huron River, east of 
the Sandusky, about six or eight miles from Lake Erie. 
Outside of the gateway of each of these two intrench- 
ments, which lay within a mile of each other, were a 
number of large flat mounds, in which, the Indian pilot 
said, were buried hundreds of the slain Tallegwi, whom 
I shall hereafter, with Colonel Gibson, call Alligewi. Of 
these intrenchments Mr. Abraham Steiner, who was with 
me at the time when I saw them, gave a very accurate 
description, which was published in Philadelphia in 1789 
or 1790, in some periodical work the name of which I can 
not at present remember. When the Lenape arrived on 
the banks of the Mississippi, they sent a message to the 
Alligewi to request permission to settle themselves in 
their neighborhood. This was refused them, but they 
obtained leave to pass through the country and seek a 
settlement farther to the eastward. They accordingly be- 
gan to cross the Namaesi-Sipu, when the Alligewi, seeing 
that their numbers were so very great, and, in fact, they 
consisted of many thousands, made a furious attack upon 



nS 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



those who had crossed, threatening them all with destruc- 
tion if they dared to persist in coming over to their side 
of the river. Fired at the treachery of these people and 
the great loss of men they had sustained, and, besides, not 
being prepared for a conflict, the Lenape consulted on 
what was to be done — whether to retreat in the best 
manner they could, or to try their strength and let the 
enemy see that they were not cowards, but men, and too 
high-minded to suffer themselves to be driven off before 
they had made a trial of their strength and were con- 
vinced that the enemy was too powerful for them. The 
Mengwe, who had hitherto been satisfied with being spec- 
tators from a distance, offered to join them on condition 
that after conquering the country they should be entitled 
to share it with them. Their proposal was accepted, and 
the resolution was taken by the two nations to conquer 
or die. Having thus united their forces, the Lenape and 
Mengwe declared war against the Alligewi, and great 
battles were fought, in which many warriors fell on both 
sides. The enemy fortified their large towns and erected 
fortifications, especially on large rivers or near lakes, 
where they were successfully attacked and sometimes 
stormed by the allies. An engagement took place in 
which hundreds fell, who were afterwards buried in holes 
or laid together in heaps and covered over with earth. 
No quarter was given, so that the Alligewi at last, finding 
that their destruction was inevitable if they persisted in 
their obstinacy, abandoned the country to the conquerors, 
and fled down the Mississippi River, from whence they 
never returned. The war which was carried on with this 
nation lasted many years, during which the Lenape lost 
a great number of their warriors, while the Mengwe 
would always hang back in the rear, leaving them to face 
the enemy. In the end the conquerors divided the coun- 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 119 



try between themselves. The Mengwe made choice of 
the lands in the vicinity of the Great Lakes and on their 
tributary streams, and the Lenape took possession of the 
country to the south. For a long period of time, some 
say many hundred years, the two nations resided peace- 
fully in this country and increased very fast. Some of 
their most enterprising huntsmen and warriors crossed 
the great swamps, and, falling on the streams running to 
the eastward, followed them down to the great bay river 
(meaning the Susquehanna, which they call the great bay 
river from where the west branch falls into the main 
stream), thence into the bay itself, which we call Chesa- 
peake. As they pursued their travels partly by land and 
partly by water, sometimes near and at other times on the 
great salt-water lake, as they call the sea, they discovered 
the great river which we call the Delaware."- — Cherokees 
in Pre-Columbian Times, pp. 12-14. 

I am strongly of the opinion that it was this tradition 
that suggested to the originators of the Mormon fraud 
the story of the Nephites fleeing southward after their 
defeat at Cumorah. 

The Central Americans and Mexicans. 

Central America and Mexico were the seats of two 
distinct and semi-civilized peoples, the Mayas and Na- 
huas. Of these, the former were the more ancient and 
cultured, the latter the more recent and widespread. The 
monuments, hieroglyphics and languages of these peoples 
show marked diversities, but some of the myths and their 
calendar systems show close resemblances. 1 

In the valley of the Usumacinta, in Central America, 
tradition says there once existed a mighty Maya, or Col- 
hua, empire known as Xibalba, or the empire of Chanes, 



"Prehistoric America," p. 262. 



120 



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or Serpents, whose attributed founder was Votan, who is 
said to have come from the land of shadow beyond the 
seas. Just where his home was no one can tell, but all 
sorts of conjectures are rife. Brasseur de Bourbourg sup- 
posed it to have been in South America over the Carib- 
bean Sea and identified him and his followers with the 
fleeing Atlantes. Some of the Spanish missionaries, de- 
termined to bend every tradition to make it harmonize 
with their theories, placed it in the Old World, to which, 
they claimed, he made four visits, during which he saw 
the ruins of the Tower of Babel and Solomon's temple. 
The Chiapanese are said to have called him "the grand- 
son of that respectable old man that built the great ark" 
( ?) ; and Short says of this tradition: "The tradition of 
Votan, the founder of Maya culture, though somewhat 
warped, probably by having passed through priestly 
hands, is, nevertheless, one of the most valuable pieces 
of information which we have concerning the ancient 
Americans. Without it, our knowledge of the Mayas 
would be a hopeless blank, and the ruins of Palenque 
would be more a mystery than ever." — North Americans 
of Antiquity, p. 204. 

In Central America V otan is said to have found tribes 
of the lowest degree of culture, who had preceded him in 
the occupancy of the country. They are mentioned in the 
old traditions as the Chichimecs, and are said to have 
lived entirely by the chase. Votan apportioned the land 
among his followers, who were known as Tzequiles 
("men with petty-coats"), taught the savage Chichimecs 
the art of cooking their food, and instituted among them 
the arts of civilized life. According to Quiche chro- 
nology, the empire of Xibalba was founded in 955 B. C. 
Its capital is known in tradition as Nachan, which is 
almost universally conceded to be Palenque. 



CUM 0 RAH REVISITED 



121 



"Nachan, or the Town of Serpents, of which the ruins 
of Palenque exhibit the grandeur, was their capital." — 
Nadaillac, p. 263. 

'This Nachan is unquestionably identified with Pa- 
lenque." — Short, p. 205. 

"It is more than probable that Palenque was the capi- 
tal, as Ordonez believes — the Nachan of the Votanic 
epoch." — Bancroft, Vol. V., p. 169. 

This, however, is disputed by both Charnay and 
Thomas, who regard Palenque as having been a religious 
rather than a civil center. 1 

The empire grew so rapidly that three tributary mon- 
archies were founded with capitals at Tulan in Chiapas, 
Vtayapan in Yucatan, and Copan in Honduras, and the 
whole central region came under the sway of the scepters 
of the Votanic monarchs. But after a number of cen- 
turies of progress this empire began to decline, probably 
through internal revolts, and fell an easy prey to the 
victorious Nahuas who had come down from the north. 
Bancroft remarks : "The result was only a change of 
dynasty accompanied - by the introduction of some new 
features in government and religious rites. The old 
civilization was merged in the new, and practically lost 
its identity; so much so that all the many nationalities 
that in later times traced their origin to this central region 
were proud, whatever their language, to claim relation- 
ship with the successful Nahuas, whose institutions they 
had adopted and whose power they had shared." — Native 
Races, Vol. V., p. 234. 

From the valley of the Usumacinta colonies went out 
in several directions to people the surrounding country. 
Some went to Guatemala, where their descendants are 



1 "American Archaeology," p. 285. 



1 22 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



known still as the Cakchiquels and Quiches. After the 
eleventh century Quiche civilization was modified by 
Toltec contact and the region where they are located pre- 
sents two different sets of ruins, an older and one more 
recent ; the first evidently built by the direct descendants 
of the founders of Xibalba, the latter by those descend- 
ants after coming in contact with foreign influences and 
receiving infusions of foreign blood. Those who settled 
Yucatan are known as the Mayas even to the present day. 
They reached their golden age about a century before the 
invasion of Cortez, but were followed by defeat and their 
kingdom was broken up into a number of petty states. 
So tenaciously have they clung to their ancient language 
that, in many localities, it is still spoken in its original 
purity, and the sons of the conquerors in some instances 
have forgotten their Castilian and have adopted entirely 
the tongue of the sons of the conquered. The Tzendals 
and Tzotzils also claim to be direct descendants of the 
builders of Palenque. 

The Nahuas, the second people to exert an influ- 
ence and establish a civilization in Mexico and Central 
America, came into those countries from the north or 
northwest. "The ancient American races preserved the 
tradition of distinct migrations, in their hieroglyphics and 
pictographs. According to these traditions, it was from 
a country situated on the north or the northwest that the 
Nahuas came." — Prehistoric America, p. 272. 

It is very evident that Nahuatl immigrations continued 
from the north during a considerable period of time, be- 
ginning with their first appearance as a rival of Xibalba, 
and, if tradition is to be believed, not ending until the 
invasion of Mexico by the Aztecs and kindred tribes as 
late as three hundred years before the Conquest. 

Little is known about the early history of the Nahuas 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



123 



in Central America. Bancroft says: "The Nahua power 
grew up side by side with its Xibalban predecessor, hav- 
ing its capital Tulan apparently in Chiapas." — Native 
Races, Vol. V., p. 233. There are also good reasons for 
believing that at first this people were content to dwell 
quietly and peaceably in the Usumacinta region and that 
hostilities were not provoked until after they had suc- 
ceeded in bringing under their influence a number of wild 
tribes, who, reduced to a life of civilization, joined their 
standard in the struggle to overthrow the Votanic mon- 
archs. After the fall of Xibalba but little is heard of the 
Nahua people and their government for a number of cen- 
turies, except that at sometime prior to the fifth century 
a struggle occurred, following which there was a general 
scattering of the tribes. 

We have now reached the sixth century, when tradi- 
tion begins to assume more of the aspect of historical 
fact. Bancroft states: "As has been stated, the sixth 
century is the most remote period to which we are carried 
in the annals of Anahuac by traditions sufficiently definite 
to be considered in a strict sense as historic records." — 
Native Races, Vol. V., p. 157. 

With this century we have the advent of the Toltecs 
into Mexico. They were a Nahuan tribe and the most 
prominent representative of that people's culture of which 
we have any record. The unanimous testimony of tradi- 
tion is that they came from the north, from the mys- 
terious Hue Hue Tlapallan (Old Old Red Land), the 
nursery of the Nahua people, which has been variously 
located. Briart locates it near Lake Tulare in California; 
Becker, on the Rio Colorado ; and Baldwin, Short and 
Foster in the Mississippi Valley. But Bancroft, on the 
contrary, attempts to find this country in the Usumacinta 
region and supposes that the Toltecs were a fragment of 



I2 4 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



that people which overthrew Xibalba. Notwithstanding 
his views, however, he admits the prevalence of the tradi- 
tion, that the Toltecs came from the north, among the 
Aztecs when the Spaniards first came in contact with 
them. "It is not probable," he says, "that this idea of a 
northern origin was a pure invention of the Spaniards; 
they doubtless found among the Aztecs with whom they 
came in contact what seemed to them a prevalent popular 
notion that the ancestors of the race came from the 
north." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 217. 

Baldwin and Foster, in their works, "Ancient Amer- 
ica" and "Prehistoric Races of the United States," begin 
the Toltec period in Mexico at about 1000 B. C, instead 
of in the sixth century A. D., confounding the date of 
their rise with the traditional date of the founding of 
Palenque, and, possibly, themselves with the Nahua tribes 
who had preceded them. Among those who have dated 
the beginning of the Toltec supremacy in Mexico from 
the sixth or seventh century A. D. are Clavigero, Gal- 
latin, Humboldt, Prescott, Squier, Morton, Nott and 
Gliddon, Bancroft, Short, Bradford, Stephens, Charnay, 
Nadaillac and Thomas. This latter view is more con- 
sistent with the probabilities, for the theory is now gener- 
ally accepted that fifteen hundred years are sufficient to 
cover the building of all those cities of both Central 
America and Mexico whose ruins still remain. 

Brinton denies that the Toltecs, as they are com- 
monly described, ever existed. He says : "The Toltecs 
may have been one of the early and unimportant gentes 
of the Azteca, but even this is doubtful. The term was 
properly applied to the inhabitants of the small town of 
Tula, north of the valley of Mexico." — The American 
Race, p. 129. 

Elsewhere he says of them: "One of their" — Nahua's 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



125 



— "small bands, the Toltecs, became invested in later leg- 
ends with the halo of heroes and magicians, and were 
mythically - represented as the founders of that civiliza- 
tion which it is probable they largely borrowed in germ 
from tribes in the south of Mexico. Such as it was, 
they readily assimilated and increased it, and their dis- 
tant colonies in Nicaragua and Costa Rica carried it 
with them to these remote points."- — Myths of the New 
World, p. 42. 

It is possible that the Nahua tribes from the north, 
with a degree of culture but little above that of the Chata 
Muskoki tribes, but with progressive dispositions, coming 
in contact with the Maya civilization in Central America, 
enhanced their own culture and developed it with a num- 
ber of resemblances to the Mayan, but in a different 
channel; and that the Toltecs did not originate all the 
features of the civilization commonly ascribed to them, 
but, infusing new life into that which had been derived 
in part from Xibalba or its fragments by the Nahua tribes 
who had preceded them, developed it into that enjoyed by 
the people of Anahuac between the sixth and eleventh 
centuries of our era. 

Stephens and Charnay go to the opposite extreme of 
denying any culture in Central America at all but the 
Toltecan. Their theory is that the cities commonly 
ascribed to the ancient Mayas were built by that people 
after their career in Mexico. Charnay says: "Granted 
their building genius, seeing that both the architecture 
and the decorations of the edifices correspond to the de- 
scriptions left by historians respecting Toltec palaces and 
temples of the Uplands, we are in a position to affirm that 
there was no other civilization in Central America except 
the Toltec civilization, and that, if another existed, our 
having met with no trace of it gives us the right to deny 



126 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



it altogether." — The Ancient Cities of the New World, 
p. 278. 

The Toltecs ruled in Mexico for fh r e hundred years, 
to the eleventh century, when they were overcome by the 
Chichimecs, a people of the same Nahua stock. The 
Toltec empire was ruled by a confederacy of three cities, 
Culhuacan, Otompan and Tollan, each having its turn as 
the leading power ; the last being renowned for its culture 
and splendor, the first surviving in name the subsequent 
changes to the Conquest. On the nature of the Toltec 
overthrow Bancroft remarks: "The Toltec downfall was 
the overthrow of a dynasty, not the destruction of a peo- 
ple."— Native Races, Vol. V., p. 288. 

After their fall the great mass of the Toltec people 
quietly submitted to their successors, while the nobles, 
with their followers, fled southward, taking refuge among 
the Miztecs and Zapotecs of Oajaca and influencing the 
culture of the Quiches of Guatemala. The Chichimecs 
were, in turn, overcome by the Aztecs, who continued 
their rule to the invasion of Cortez and the fall of 
Montezuma. 

This, in brief, is the outline of the ancient history of 
Central America and Mexico, taken from the traditions 
of those countries, with the opinions and explanations of 
modern writers included. It is not at all unlikely that 
much that is recorded is a statement of fact and truly 
historical, while much is purely mythical. 

The Peruvians. 

Trustworthy information does not carry us back in 
the history of Peru further than a few centuries before 
the conquest by Pizarro. W nat we have has been ob- 
tained chiefly from the works of Garcilasso de la Vega 
and Montesinos, the former a descendant, through his 



CUM O RAH REVISITED 127 

mother, of the Incas, and whose chief aim seems to be 
to glorify his people; and the latter a Spaniard whose 
work is of doubtful importance. 

According to Montesinos, Peruvian history is to be 
divided into two epochs : the first lasting from the dawn 
of civilization to the first or second century of our era; 
the second, from 102 1 A. D., when the empire was recon- 
structed under the first Inca, to the Conquest. 

Ancient Peru was more extensive than the present, 
and comprised, along with what is now included within 
its boundaries, the country of Ecuador and parts of Bo- 
livia, Chili and Argentina, a territory three thousand 
miles long by four hundred broad. Here are to be found 
ruins noted for their massiveness ; long, well-paved 
roads; aqueducts, and other evidences of a taste and 
mechanical skill considerably beyond the ordinary sav- 
age. Marquis Nadaillac is pleased to call the Peruvian 
the "most highly civilized empire of the two Americas," 
and indeed, in some respects, at the time of the Con- 
quest, it surpassed even that of Montezuma. The Peru- 
vians were "equally advanced in the various mechanical 
and fine arts," says Bancroft; "except sculpture and 
architectural decoration, they lived under as perfect a 
system of government and rendered homage to less 
bloodthirsty gods." — Native Races, Vol. IV., p. 792. 

The Incan capital, Cuzco, from cosca, Peruvian for 
"heaps," was built upon the foundations of a more 
ancient city which dated back to an earlier period, and 
authorities are pretty well agreed that Peruvian history 
is to be divided into at least two epochs. 

"It is now agreed that the Peruvian antiquities repre- 
sent two distinct periods in the ancient history of the 
country, one being much older than the other." — Ancient 
America, p. 226. 



128 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



"The most remarkable monuments of antiquity are 
considered the works of a people preceding that found 
by Pizarro in possession of the country, and bearing very 
much the same relation to the subjects of the Incas as 
the ancient Mayas bore to the Quiches of Guatemala, or 
perhaps the Toltecs to the Aztecs." — Native Races, Vol. 
IV., p. 791. 

"We may reasonably conclude that there existed in 
the country a race advanced in civilization before the 
time of the Incas ; and, in conformity with nearly every 
tradition, we may derive this race from the neighborhood 
of Lake Titicaca ; a conclusion strongly confirmed by the 
imposing architectural remains which still endure, after 
the lapse of so many years on its borders." — Conquest of 
Peru, Vol. I., p. 7. 

"It is certain that before the time of Manco Capac" 
— the first Inca — "the inhabitants of the country were by 
no means plunged in barbarism. The Quichua culture 
had a past, of which the theocratic and social organiza- 
tion founded by the first Inca was but a development. 
Numerous buildings are undoubtedly earlier than the 
Incas, at least than those of whom authentic history has 
preserved an account." — Prehistoric America, p. 389. 

Just when this first period began no one can surely 
tell, but Montesinos begins it five hundred years after 
the deluge, when its first inhabitants, he says, "flowed in 
abundance towards the valley of Cuzco, conducted by 
four brothers." Baldwin attaches some probability to 
this myth and says : "He discards the wonder-stories told 
of Manco Capac and Mama Oello, and gives the Peru- 
vian nation a beginning which is, at least, not incredible. 
It was originated, he says, by a people led by four broth- 
ers, who settled in the valley of Cuzco, and developed 
civilization there in a very human way. The youngest 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



i2g 



of these brothers assumed supreme authority, and became 
the first of a long line of sovereigns." — Ancient America, 
p. 264. 

This period, according to our Spanish author, lasted 
till the first or second century of our era, during which, 
he says, sixty-four sovereigns reigned. For a thousand 
years after its close the country was broken up into a 
number of petty states until 102 1 A. D., when the first 
Inca began to rule. The Incas ruled until the Conquest, 
when Atahualpa, the last, was cruelly put to death by 
Pizarro. There were twelve or thirteen of these sov- 
ereigns whose names have been preserved in the lists of 
Garcilasso and Montesinos. Dr. Brinton unhesitatingly 
denounces the list of Montesinos as spurious. He says: 
"Historians are agreed that the long lists of Incas in the 
pages of Montesinos, extending about two thousand 
years anterior to the Conquest, are spurious, due to the 
imagination or the easy credulity of that writer." — 
Essays of an Americanist, p. 23. 

This, in brief, is the outline of the aboriginal history 
of America as given in the traditions. That some of it 
is untrustworthy I grant, but that much of it is to be 
depended upon is proved by the corroboratory evidences 
from the languages and remains. If the reader will com- 
pare this outline with the historical outline of the Book 
of Mormon as given in Chapter I., he will find but few 
points of agreement between the two. 

ARCHAEOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE IN 183O. 

I pass now to the Mormon claim that prior to the 
year 1830, in which the Book of Mormon came out and 
the Mormon Church was organized, there was not 
enough known of the antiquities of America to enable 
some one to get up such a story as the Book of Mormon. 



130 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



On this point Elder H. A. Stebbins writes : "But many 
people innocently suppose that numerous books were in 
existence before 1830, from which it would have been 
comparatively easy for something to have been written 
as a work of fiction, just as Mr. Clark Braden boldly and 
falsely stated about the work of Josiah Priest. Desiring 
to know for myself how this was, I have either examined 
the books themselves or the encyclopedia accounts of 
them and their authors, and the result is that of over 
twenty chief writers upon American antiquities only one 
book is proven to have been published in the English lan- 
guage prior to the copyrighting of the Book of Mormon, 
and that is the work of Captain Del Rio, which was pub- 
lished in London in 1822." — Book of Mormon Lectures, 
p. 18. 

In a foot-note on the same page he adds : "Probably 
now two with the work of Helen Maria Williams, if hers 
was published before 1830." Her work, a translation of 
Humboldt, was printed in 1814. (Nadaillac's "Prehis- 
toric America," p. 284, foot-note.) 

In his tract, "Modern Knowledge of the Antiquities 
of America," p. 4, Mr. Stebbins says further: "And to 
those, whether they are in the church or out of it, who 
have gathered the idea that for sometime before the pub- 
lication of the Book of Mormon there was world-wide 
knowledge of the existence of the ruined cities of Central 
America, we say that they have certainly obtained a very 
wrong impression, one that is contrary to the truth. And 
that the opposers are either very deficient in their educa- 
tion upon this point, or else they purposely leave their 
readers and hearers in the dark as to the real facts, which, 
when stated, will make the whole subject clear to all who 
desire the truth, and only the truth." 

If this gentleman has examined only a few more than 



CUMORAH REVISITED 131 



twenty of the chief works on American antiquities, or 
the encyclopedia accounts of them, his research has cer- 
tainly not been extensive, and this accounts for his con- 
clusion, and possibly what he says about the education of 
others may apply to himself. While it is not claimed that 
there was world-wide knowledge, using this term in its 
broadest sense, of the ruined cities of Central America in 
1830, it is claimed, and can be proved, that there was 
enough known of them before that date to have enabled 
some one to get up just such a story as the Book of 
Mormon. The fact is that there were a considerable 
number of works on science, travel and adventure pub- 
lished in the English language before 1830 which con- 
tained descriptions of the ruined cities of Mexico, Cen- 
tral America and Peru. Some of these were translations 
of works in French and Spanish ; others were works by 
English and American authors. The following are the 
names of a number of works in the English language 
which, before 1830, described the antiquities of Central 
America and Mexico. They are either quoted from or 
referred to in the writings of Bancroft, Prescott and 
other later writers : 

''Conquest of Mexico," De Solis, London, 1735. 

"History of America," Herrera, London, 1740. 

"History of America," Robertson, London, 1777. 

"Origin of the Tribes and Nations of America," Bar- 
ton, Philadelphia, 1797. 

"Account of the Settlement of Honduras," Hender- 
son, London, 181 1. 

"Decades," Peter Martyr, London, 1812. 

"Researches," Humboldt, London, 1814. 

"Researches in America," McCulloh, Baltimore, 181 7. 

"Spanish America," Bonneycastle, London, 1818. 

"Travels in North America," Bingley, London, 1821. 



132 



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"Description of an Ancient City," Del Rio, London, 
1822. 

"Six Months' Residence in Mexico," Bullock, Lon- 
don, 1823. 

"History of Guatemala," Juarros, London, 1824. 

"History of Mexico," Mill, London, 1824. 

"Notes on Mexico," Poinsett, London, 1825. 

"Historical Researches," Ranking, London, 1827. 

"Journal," Lyon, London, 1828. 

"Mexico Illustrated," Beaufoy, London, 1828. 

"Mexico in 1827," Ward, London, 1828. 

While most of these writers have not written directly 
upon the subject of American antiquities, they have all 
mentioned, and some have quite fully described, the 
monuments of Mexico and Central America. Thus 
Copan, which was discovered in the year 1576, and 
which was very accurately described by the Spanish 
licentiate, Palacios, was given a lengthy notice in the 
"History of Guatemala," by Juarros. This same author 
also described other ruins throughout Guatemala. Her- 
rera and Peter Martyr both gave descriptions of the 
Maya structures on the eastern coast of Yucatan. Mitla, 
the ancient capital of Oajaca, was referred to by Bonney- 
castle and Mill. An account of Papantla was given by 
Bingley. Certain mounds in Panuco were mentioned by 
Lyon. There are a number of early descriptions of Cho- 
lula given in the works of Robertson, Poinsett, Bullock, 
Ward, Beaufoy, Mill and McCulloh. And the antiquities 
of Mexico were written about by Robertson, Beaufoy, 
Bonneycastle, Lyon, Poinsett, McCullch and Ranking. 
Even Palenque, which Mr. Stebbins, on the strength of 
a statement from Stephens, declares could net have been 
known of in time for Joseph Smith to have used the 
knowledge in "fabricating the Book of Mormon," was 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



133 



written about by at least three English authors, if Ban- 
croft has made no mistake, before the copyrighting of 
the Book of Mormon in 1829. These authors are Juar- 
ros, Bullock and McCulloh, the last devoting several 
pages of his "Researches in America" to its description. 1 
On the antiquities of Peru, before 1830, we have such 
works as the "Naturall and Morall Historie of the East 
and West Indies," London, 1604, by Acosta ; ''History 
of America," London, 1777, by Robertson; and ''Voyage 
to South America," London, -1806, by Ulloa. On Rob- 
ertson's work Justin Windsor, in his "Narrative and 
Critical History of America," Vol. I., p. 269, says: "Rob- 
ertson's excellent view of the story of the Incas in his 
'History of America' was for many years the sole source 
of information on the subject for the general English 
public." 

The antiquities of the Mound Builders were also well 
known of, and extensively written upon, a number of 
years before the Book of Mormon appeared. The con- 
troversy over the question of the nationality of the 
Mound Builders began as early as 1803. The American 
Antiquarian Society was organized at Worcester, Mass., 
in 18 1 2, and for it Caleb Atwater surveyed the aboriginal 
works at Circleville, Ohio, in 1819. 2 And Lewis Cass 
wrote of the mounds in the North American Review for 
January, 1826. The following works on the antiquities 
of the United States were extant before 1830: 

"History of Louisiana," Du Pratz, London, 1763. 

1 "Native Races," Vol. IV., p. 294, footnote. Since writing the above 
I have run across the following statement in Justin Windsor's "Narrative 
and Critical History of America," Vol. I., p. 169: "The earliest general 
account of these ancient peoples" — of Mexico and Central America — "which 
we have in English is in the 'History of America,' by William Robertson." 
This work was published in the year 1777, 

2 "The Mound Builders," p. 3. 



134 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



"Travels," Bartram, London, 1766. 

"History of Florida/' Romans, 1775. 

"North American Indians," Adair, London, 1775. 

"Travels," Carver, 1776. 

"Notes on Virginia," Jefferson, Boston, 1802. 

"Travels," Lewis and Clark, London, 1814. 

"Views of Louisiana," Breckinridge, Pittsburg, 1814. 

"Researches in America," McCulloh, Baltimore, 18 17. 

"Travels in Arkansas," Nuttal, 1821. 

"Gazetteer for Illinois and Missouri," Beck, 1821. 

"Natural and Aboriginal History Tennessee," Hey- 
wood, Nashville, 1823. 

In addition to these, we have such other writers as 
Timberlake, Hunter, Barton, Colden, Loskiel, Stoddard 
and Charlevoix, who wrote, more or less extensively, on 
the subjects of antiquities and Indian life before 1830. 1 

The lists of books just given prove that there was 
ample information before 1830 for some one to get up 
just such a story as the Book of Mormon. The fact is 
that Adair's "American Indians," Robertson's ''History 
of America" and Barton's "Origin of the Tribes and 
Nations of America" would have furnished Solomon 
Spaulding, long before 1812, all the information neces- 
sary to write out its outline as claimed. 

Not only was there a considerable number of works 
on American antiquities extant before 1830, but the basic 
theories of the Book of Mormon were those held by their 
authors and were popular at that time. 

1. According to the Book of Mormon the arts, habits, 
customs, language and religion of ancient America were 

1 Justin Windsor, "Narrative and Critical History of America," Vol. 
I., p. 398, says of Barton's opinion on the nationality of the Mound 
Builders: "B. S. Barton, in 'Observations in Some Parts of Natural 
History' (London, 1787), credits the Toltecs with building them" — the 
mounds— -"whom he considered the descendants of the Danes." 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



135 



brought from the Old World. This opinion was held by 
the great majority of Americanists at the beginning of 
the last century, one deriving American culture from 
China, another from Atlantis, another from Polynesia, 
and another from Palestine. 

2. The book claims that the first inhabitants of this 
continent came direct from the Tower of Babel. A be- 
lief that was shared in by such early writers as Ulloa, 
Villagutierre, Torquemada, L'Estrange, Thompson and 
others. 

3. The book declares that the American Indians are 
descendants of the children of Israel. Of earlier writers 
who held this view may be mentioned Thorowgood, 
Penn, Ben Ezra, Beatty, Edwards, Stiles, Smith, Boudi- 
not, Adair, Mayhew and Eliot. In 1873 Foster declared 
that this theory was "profoundly entertained a century 
ago." — Prehistoric Races, p. 323. 

4. The book tells us further that the valleys of the 
Ohio and the Mississippi were inhabited in ancient times 
by highly civilized peoples, distinct from the Ameri- 
can Indians. This theory was not new in 1830, having 
been advanced about the beginning of the century by 
Rev. Thaddeus M. Harris, and was held at that time by 
the greater number of American archaeologists. 

5. After the defeat of the Nephites at Hill Cumorah 
we are told that their remnant fled into the "south 
countries." Heckewelder, as we have seen, gave to the 
world in 18 19 a Delaware tradition according to which 
the Tallegwi, the Ohio mound builders, after their defeat 
by the combined forces of the Lenape and Hurons, also 
fled southward. 

6. The book further declares that two distinct, civil- 
ized peoples, the Jaredites and Nephites, dwelt, in ancient 
times, in Central America and Mexico. Long before 



136 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



1830 the ethnical distinction between the Mayas and Na- 
huas had been observed. 

7. The Jaredites, it is claimed, were all exterminated, 
with the exception of two individuals. The theory of 
"extinct," "vanished" and "lost" races was held long be- 
fore it entered into the minds of Spaulding, Rigdon and 
Smith. 

8. The belief that the Christian religion had been 
preached in America, as made in the Book of Mormon, 
was first advocated by many of the Spanish priests of 
Mexico, who saw in the Aztec god, Quetzalcoatl, the 
apostle Thomas, who, they thought, preached in America 
during the first century of our era. 

9. Smith's claim that he found the plates in Hill 
Cumorah may have been suggested by the Stockbridge 
Indian tradition, obtained by Dr. West and published in 
Boudinot's Star in the West in 1816, according to which 
"their fathers were once in possession of a 'Sacred Book' 
which was handed down from generation to generation 
and at last hid in the earth." 

These theories have pretty much all been disproved 
and given up. Americanists no longer look abroad for 
the origin of American culture, but have come to con- 
sider it as purely American, developed here and possess- 
ing no marks by which it may be traced to the Old 
World. No ethnologists of note any longer hold to the 
opinion that the American Indians are descendants of the 
children of Israel, having fully satisfied themselves that 
the analogies cited by Adair are insufficient to establish 
any such relationship. The highly civilized Mound 
Builders have also passed under the investigation: cf the 
Smithsonian and other institutions, and in their place we 
have a people who had reached only the "upper status 
of savagery." The Tallegwi, it is now known, were not 



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137 



the Nephites fleeing southward from Cumorah, but were 
only the Cherokees who were driven from their ancient 
seats north of the Ohio River by the combined forces of 
the Lenapes and Hurons, and who fled southward into 
that country which they inhabited at the coming of the 
whites. The theory of "extinct," "vanished" and "lost" 
races, made so prominent in the Book of Mormon, has 
given place to the more sober presumption that the build- 
ers of the ancient American cities were only those races 
who were found here at the time of the Discovery, and 
the ancestors of existing native tribes. And Quetzal- 
coatl turns out to be neither St. Thomas nor Jesus Christ, 
but only the god of the air in Aztec mythology. 

If he is but aware of it, the anti-Mormon polemic has, 
in the data acquired by our archaeologists, a mass of 
evidence which, if rightly used, will completely overturn 
the strongholds of Mormonism. The trend of research 
has not been, as Mormon writers try to make it appear, 
in the direction of the Book of Mormon, but away from 
it, as will be observed by any one who will read the 
up-to-date works on the subject. It is a noticeable fact 
that the defenders of the book appeal for material with 
which to defend their claims far more often to works 
written by the older authors than they do to works 
written later. There seems to be a decided partiality for 
Adair, Boudinot and Priest, although the latest of these, 
Priest, wrote over seventy years ago. These, on the 
question of the relationship of the Indians to the Jews, 
ire their standard authors. On the subject of the Mound 
Builders, their chief authority is Baldwin's "Ancient 
America," a work published in 1871, and before the more 
critical study of the works of this people had been made. 
Baldwin's theory, under later investigation, has been 
completely demolished, and to-day such writers as Pow- 



138 



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ell. Holmes, Henshaw, Thomas, Brinton, Fowke, Moore- 
head, Carr, Shaler and Dellenbaugh speak of the Mound 
Builders, not as a vanished race, but as those very Indian 
tribes who inhabited the mound region at the coming of 
the whites. Of course such facts are carefully concealed 
by Mormon writers from the eyes of their readers, they 
writing as though all discoveries were corroboratory of 
their claims. They are further to be charged with being 
lovers of the fanciful, the marvelous, the sensational and 
the impossible. Their books are full of the accounts of 
''wonderful finds,'' sensational newspaper reports and the 
descriptions of tablets and plates acknowledged to be 
frauds by all good archaeologists. These are dealt out to 
a gullible public without question, and are received by a 
certain class in the same way. In one of their recent 
works appears, unquestioned, a newspaper report of "A 
Prehistoric Town 125 Feet Under the Earth." 1 Sev- 
eral others contain long descriptions of the well-known 
frauds, the "Kinderhook Plates" and the "Newark Tab- 
let." The more the antiquities of America are studied, 
the less of the marvelous appears, and the reader may 
justly look with suspicion upon every report that ascribes 
to the ancient Americans things exceedingly extraordi- 
nary. 

1 "Parsons' Text-book," p. 5. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



139 



CHAPTER III. 

Were the Ancient Americans of the White Race? — White In- 
dians — White and Bearded Men — Light-haired Mummies — 
American Craniology. 

The origin of the people of America and of their 
culture are questions on which there has been no small 
amount of speculation, and antiquarians, in respect to 
their theories, are to be divided into three classes: (i) 
Those who hold that both the people and their culture 
were exotic. (2) Those who hold that both were indig- 
enous. And (3) those who hold that the people were of 
exotic origin, but who claim that their culture was purely 
an American product and not derived from any nation or 
nations whatever of the Old World. 

To the first class belong such writers as Ranking, 
Lang, Jones, Delafield and Adair, who advocated, 
respectively, the descent, either in whole or in part, of 
the Americans from the Mongolians, Polynesians, Phoe- 
nicians, Egyptians and Israelites ; to the second, such 
writers as Morton, Nott and Gliddon, and others who 
deny the unity of the human species; and to the third, 
such of our later writers as Brinton, Powell and Marquis 
Nadaillac. 

The Book of Mormon teaches that both the people 
and the culture of ancient America came from the Old 
World. The Jaredites, coming from the Tower of Babel 
about twenty-two centuries B. C, landed upon the east 
coast of Central America, and for sixteen hundred years 
held sway over a territory which, at the wind-up of their 
career, extended from Honduras on the south to the 
Great Lakes on the north, and east and west from ocean 



140 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



to ocean ; and the Xephites, immigrating from Jerusalem 
about 600 B. C, and landing upon the coast of Chili, by 
gradual movements spread northward, until, at the close 
cf their national existence in 385 A. D., they occupied 
both Americas. 

These peoples, it is claimed, were the authors of those 
remarkable cities whose ruins still remain in Peru, Cen- 
tral America and Mexico. "And according to both the 
Book of Mormon and science," says Elder Stebbins, "it 
was not the red man who built cities and erected palaces. 
It was a nobler race, and they remained fair until they 
amalgamated with the Lamanites and were brought un- 
der the same cursing." — Lectures, p. 177. 

With the history of the Jaredites and Xephites the 
book also gives us what its defenders claim to be the 
only true account of the origin of the red race and also 
its history for a thousand years from its beginning. Ac- 
cording to this account, the American is an offshoot of 
the Semitic branch of the Caucasian race, which, by a 
miracle, was transformed in color from white to coppery, 
the cause of this wonderful transformation being a 
willful and persistent disobedience to the commands of 
God. 

Nephi gives the following account of this miraculous 
change : "And it came to pass that I, Xephi, did cause 
my people to be industrious, and to labor with their 
hands. And it came to pass that they would that I 
should be their king. But I, X'ephi, was desirous that 
they should have no king ; nevertheless, I did for them 
according to that which was in my power. And, behold, 
the words of the Lord had been fulfilled unto my breth- 
ren, which he spake concerning them, that I should be 
their ruler and their teacher : wherefore. I had been their 
ruler and their teacher, according to the commandments 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



141 



of the Lord, until the time they sought to take away my 
life. Wherefore, the word of the Lord was fulfilled 
which he spake unto me, saying: That inasmuch as they 
will not hearken unto thy word, they shall be cut off 
from the presence of the Lord. And behold, they were 
cut off from his presence. And he had caused the curs- 
ing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because 
of their iniquity. For, behold, they had hardened their 
hearts against him, that they had become like unto a 
flint. Wherefore, as they were white, and exceeding 
fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing 
unto my people, the Lord God did cause a skin of black- 
ness to come upon them. And thus saith the Lord God, 
I will cause that they shall be loathsome unto thy people, 
save they shall repent of their iniquities. And cursed 
shall be the seed of him that mixeth with their seed : for 
they shall be cursed even with the same cursing. And 
the Lord spake it, and it was done. And because of 
their cursing which was upon them, they did become an 
idle people, full of mischief and subtlety, and did seek 
in the wilderness for beasts of prey." — 2 Nephi 4: 4. 

This, then, is the origin of the American Indians, if 
the Book of Mormon is true. 

Without further introductory remarks I pass imme- 
diately to a consideration of the various lines of evidence 
— physiological, traditional and craniological — which 
Mormons produce in support of their claim that the first 
Americans were of the white race. To prove that the 
ancient Americans were of the white race, or were 
white races, Mormons confidently refer us to the tribes 
of so-called "white Indians," as the Mandans and 
Menominees, who, it is declared, are remnants of the 
ancient population ; to the traditions of "white and 
bearded men," who are mentioned as the authors of the 



142 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



ancient civilization of Peru, Central America and 
Mexico, which are explained in harmony with the ac- 
counts of the advent of the Jaredites and Xephites; to 
the mummies with red or chestnut hair from the moun- 
tain-caves of Tennessee and Kentucky, the cliff-houses 
of the southwest and the huacas of Peru, in which, it is 
declared, the type of the ancient race is preserved ; and 
to the crania from the ancient burial-places, which we 
are told are far superior to those of our American 
Indians in both skull structure and shape. These are the 
evidences which Mormon writers insist corroborate the 
Book of Mormon. 

WHITE INDIANS. 

Among the various Indian tribes which have been 
termed "white Indians" may be mentioned the Yurucares 
of Bolivia, the tribes of the upper Orinoco, the Mandans 
of the upper Missouri, the Menominees of Wisconsin 
and the Kolosch of the northwest coast. These tribes 
are distinguished by a light shade of complexion from 
their fellows. 

It is claimed that these so-called white Indians are 
the descendants of the remnant of the Xephites which 
escaped at the battle of Cumorah. "Doubtless," says 
Elder Stebbins, "they were scattered and driven in bands 
to various secluded places, and from them came the 
light-complexioned tribes who have been known since 
the time the Europeans settled this country, such as the 
Mandans and other tribes mentioned by travelers and 
explorers." — Lectures, p. 262. 

But it can not be proved that these tribes have a 
drop of White blood in their veins. Their color does 
not prove it, for it is not a darker shade of white, but a 
lighter shade of brown or coppery, while their other 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



i43 



physical characteristics link them closely to the darker 
tribes around them. 

On this point Bradford writes : "But yet no varieties 
have been observed which approach the Indians any- 
where near the white and black races, and where an ex- 
ception occurs in one particular, the other peculiarities 
are still retained. It is true, many statements have been 
made concerning the existence of white and black In- 
dians, but, upon examination, they are found to have 
proceeded usually from the early travelers, who were 
often vague and exaggerated in their use of terms ; or to 
have been founded upon misnomers ; or to have related 
to tribes who had intermarried with Europeans." — 
American Antiquities, p. 259. 

Brinton, also, after giving American anthropology 
his close attention for a lifetime, declares that there is no 
tribe on this continent which possesses a truly white skin. 
He says: "The hue of the skin is generally said to be 
reddish, or coppery, or cinnamon color, or burnt coffee 
color. It is brown of various shades, with an undertone 
of red. Individuals or tribes vary from the prevailing 
hue, but not with reference to climate. The Kolosch 
of the northwest coast are very light colored; but not 
more so than the Yurucares of the Bolivian Andes. The 
darkest are far from black, and the lightest by no means 
white." — The American Race, p. 39. 

In respect to its variations in color, the red race has 
not as wide extremes as the Ethiopian and the Caucasian. 
The former includes within its limits the yellow Hotten- 
tot and the coal-black tribes of the tropics ; while in the 
latter the color variations run from the blue-eyed, blond- 
haired Teuton to the dark-skinned Arab. The light color 
of some of the American tribes does, therefore, not 
prove that they have White blood in their veins, but is, 



144 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



evidently, only one of those physical anomalies met with 
among all the varieties of mankind. 

The whiteness of many of these tribes has also been 
grossly exaggerated. 

The Menominees, for instance, are not truly white; 
Short says they are of an "ash color," the color of "white 
mulattoes," and a friend of mine, who has frequently 
seen them, informs me that they are "smoky white." In 
their other features they are distinctly Indian, having the 
same coarse, straight, black hair and high cheek bones of 
the tribes around them, while they are connected linguis- 
tically with the Chippeways, Ottawas and Pottawatamies. 

The white Indians of the upper Orinoco, according to 
Humboldt, who gave them a personal examination, differ 
"from other Indians only by a much less tawny skin, 
having at the same time the features, the stature and the 
smooth, straight, black hair of their race;" and Brinton 
asserts that their light color "is not a question of descent, 
but of climatic surroundings and mode of life." 1 

As for the Yurucares, the traveler, D'Orbigny, sug- 
gests that their fair complexion is due to their residence 
in the dense forests in a hot, humid atmosphere. And this 
explanation seems very reasonable, for it is an unques- 
tioned fact that darkness and humidity have a tendency 
to bleach out the skin into a lighter hue. He also observed 
large patches of albinism upon many of their persons. 2 

The Mandans, while they, or some of them, have light 
complexions, blue eyes and chestnut hair, have other 
peculiarities which are distinctively Indian. Dellenbaugh 
("The Xorth Americans of Yesterday," p. 394) gives 
us a cut of Rushing Eagle, a Mandan chief, in whom are 
displayed the typical features of the red race: low fore- 



1 "The American Race," p. 271. 

2 "The American Race," p. 297. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



145 



head, large nose, high cheek bones and black hair. And 
Bradford suggests that the light complexion of some of 
the members of this tribe may be due to intermixture. 
He says: "But connected as they are by affinities in lan- 
guage to other tribes whose Indian physiognomy can not 
be doubted, it is possible that these peculiarities have 
been produced by an intermixture of the race." — Ameri- 
can Antiquities, p. 267. 

"The Algonkins," says Brinton, "with one voice called 
those of their tribes living nearest the rising sun Abnakis, 
our ancestors at the east, or at the dawn ; literally, our 
white ancestors." — Myths of the New World, p. 207. 
From this a Mormon author 1 insists that the ancestors of 
the Algonkins were truly white. But this claim has no 
good foundation, for the Abnakis are not white, but 
copper colored, and they derive their name, not from a 
peculiarity of complexion, but from the fact that they 
are the farthest east of any of the Algonkin tribes and 
dwell toward the "white land," the land of the rising sun. 

Donnelly is a prominent Mormon witness on the light 
complexion of the ancient xAmericans. He states that the 
ancient Quichuas of Peru were a "fair-skinned race, with 
blue eyes and light and even auburn hair," and that their 
descendants "are to this day an olive-skinned people, 
much lighter in color than the Indian tribes subjugated 
by them." But the assertion of this author relative to 
the color of the ancient Peruvians is wholly gratuitous. 
He does not know and can not prove what he claims. 
And his descriptions of their descendants do not accord 
with the descriptions of other and better authors. 

Says Bradford: "The present Peruvian Indians, who 
are of the same race as the ancient inhabitants, are de- 



1 "Divinity of the Book of Mormon Proven by Archaeology," p. 120. 



146 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



scribed as of a copper color, with high cheek bones, small 
black eyes set widely apart, hair coarse and black, with- 
out any inclination to curl, beard scanty, nose somewhat 
flattened, small stature, and the feet small: these char- 
acters are of general prevalence among all the natives." 
— American Antiquities, p. 263. 

And Brinton states : "Cieza de Leon and other early 
Spanish writers frequently refer to the general physical 
sameness of the Peruvian tribes. They found all of them 
somewhat undersized, brown in color, beardless, and of 
but moderate muscular force." — The American Race, 
p. 210. 

These writers positively deny that the Quichuas were 
of a lighter color "than the Indian tribes subjugated by 
them," and Bradford declares that all of the Peruvian 
tribes are of the same race as the ancient inhabitants. 

Some of the tribes owe their light color to an admix- 
ture with the whites since the discovery of the continent- 
in 1492. For instance, the great number of half-breeds 
who are so common in North America. The Boroanes 
of Chili, a tribe of Araucanians, with light eyes, fair 
complexion and red hair, also owe these peculiarities to 
descent from women taken in Spanish towns. 1 

Among the Pueblos of the Southwest albinos are 
common. They have light complexions, light hair and 
blue or pink eyes. Bancroft says of the Pueblos and 
Mokis : "Albinos are at times seen amongst them, who 
are described as having very fair complexions, light hair 
and blue or pink eyes." — Native Races, Vol. L, p. 530. 
Brinton informs us that the Pueblos are not all of the 
same stock, but that they belong to at least four families : 
the Moki, Kera, Tehua and Zuni. On the albinos among 



1 "American Antiquities," p. 262. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



147 



the Zuni we have the following report: "Many of the In- 
dians of Zuni (New Mexico) are white. They have a 
fair skin, blue eyes, chestnut or auburn hair, and are 
quite good looking. They claim to be full-blooded Zuni- 
ans, and have no tradition of intermarriage with any 
foreign race. The circumstance creates no surprise 
among this people, for from time immemorial a similar 
class of people has existed among the tribe." 

But, as could be expected, Elder Walker, who is 
anxious to find some evidence by which he may establish 
the Book of Mormon claim that a white race once inhab- 
ited America, will not have it that way, and declares that 
"the description of the Zunians will not apply to Al- 
binos." — Ruins Revisited, p. 202. He gives no reason 
for making so unwarranted an assertion, and the reader 
is left to infer that he has none. There is no more reason 
for assuming that the peculiar whiteness of the Indian 
albinos is due to descent from the Caucasian race than 
that the peculiar whiteness of the negro albino is, which 
we know is not the case. 

There is as much reason for claiming that the ancient 
Americans were a black race as that they were white, 
if we are to be led to a conclusion by the complexion 
of their descendants ; for the Kaws of Kansas, Short 
declares, "are nearly as black as the negro," and Win- 
chell informs us that the "ancient Indians of California, 
in the latitude of forty-two degrees, were as black as 
the negroes of Guinea." And invariably the light-com- 
plexioned tribes are lower in point of culture than are 
many of those which are darker skinned. And this is 
inconsistent with the theory that they are descendants 
of the civilized and enlightened Nephites. The semi- 
civilized tribes of Peru, which contended so strongly 
against Pizarro, are described as copper colored, with 



148 



CL'MORAH REVISITED 



coarse black hair, high cheek bones, scanty beards, noses 
somewhat flattened, small statures and small feet. The 
enterprising Mayas are said by Brinton to be "short, 
strong, dark and brachycephalic." 1 And the Xahuas are 
said to be copper colored, with thick, black, coarse hair, 
thin beards and black eyes. Thus we look in vain for 
physical marks among the more civilized tribes of Amer- 
ica by which descent from the Nephites may be traced. 

TRADITIONS OF WHITE AXD BEARDED MEN. 

The traditions of the appearance in America of white 
and bearded men are warped into harmony with the 
accounts of the advent of the Jaredites and Xephites. 
Some of these men are said to have come in ships, and 
all are said to have introduced civilization among the 
natives. 

All of the more advanced nations had traditions of 
the coming of these civilizers. The Xahuas had 'tfieir 
Quetzalcoatl. the Tzendals their Yotan. the Zapotecs 
their Wixeepecocha, the Mayas their Zamna, the Quiches 
their Gucumatz, the Muyscas their Bcchica, and the 
Ouichuas their Yiracocha. There is a striking sameness 
to these old tales, all agreeing that their heroes were 
white and bearded ; that they appeared suddenly and 
mysteriously : and that, after their work was done, they 
disappeared in the same way. It was the expectancy of 
the return of Quetzalcoatl, and the confounding of Cor- 
tez with him, that made the conquest of Mexico no more 
difficult than it was. 

Quetzalcoatl is described as a white man with digni- 
fied bearing, large, round head, broad forehead and long 
black hair. He is said to have come to Cholula. Mexico, 
from Yucatan (some accounts say from Tulha, Mexico), 



1 "The American Race." p. 154. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



and is declared to have been a man of great moderation, 
bitterly opposed to war and violence and to the sacrifice 
of human beings. After twenty years in Cholula, during 
which time he taught the people the art of working in 
silver, he departed toward the east with the promise that 
he would return at a future day and rule the land. Many 
of the Spanish fathers identified Quetzalcoatl with the 
apostle Thomas, but Lord Kingsborough and Elder Steb- 
bins think he was none other than Jesus Christ. His 
name signifies bright or shining snake, or feathered ser- 
pent, and in his deification he stands in Aztec mythology 
as the god of the wind or air. 1 

Votan, the hero of Chiapas, came, according to tradi- 
tion, from across the sea with a company of followers 
called by the natives "Tzequiles." They are said to have 
been white and bearded and to have taught the savage 
Chichimecs the arts of civilized life. To him is ascribed 
the honor of the erection of Palenque and the establish- 
ment of the empire of the Serpents about a thousand 
years before Christ. Mormons think that Votan and his 
followers were the Jaredites from Babel. 2 

Wixeepecocha, the white and bearded culture hero of 
the Zapotecs, is said to have come from the sea and to 
have been a man of venerable aspect who dressed in the 
habiliments of a monk. In character he was like Quet- 
zalcoatl, and was so strict a celibate that no woman was 
allowed in his presence except to give her auricular 
confession, a practice which he established among the 
people. A legend says that, after suffering persecution, 
he mysteriously disappeared from the summit of Mount 
C'empoaltepec. 3 



1 "Myths oi the New World," p. 213. 

2 "Parsons' Text-book," pp. 14, 15. "The Book Unsealed," Chap. III. 

3 "Native Races," Vol. III., p. 455. 



150 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



The traditional account of Zamna is that he entered 
Yucatan very early, some say coming from the west, 
others from the east. According to one account, he was 
the son of Hunab Ku, "the only god," and his spouse, 
Ixazaluoh. Unlike Wixeepecocha, he was well received 
by the people, who, after his death, founded the city of 
Izamal over his grave. To him is ascribed the honor of 
the invention of hieroglyphical writing. 1 

The Quiche account of Gucumatz very closely resem- 
bles that of Quetzalcoatl, and, as their names mean the 
same, good authorities have decided that they are one 
and the same mythical character, and identical with the 
Maya god, Kukulkan. 2 

Bochica, so tradition says, after civilizing the Muys- 
cas of Colombia, retired into a monastic state for two 
thousand years. 3 

And Viracocha, "foam of the sea," arising from the 
bosom of Lake Titicaca, made the sun and moon and 
placed them in the heavens, presided over the erection 
of the Peruvian cities on the islands and western shore 
of the lake, and then disappeared in the western ocean. 4 

Bancroft sums up the accounts of these culture heroes 
in the following: "Although bearing various names and 
appearing in different countries, the American culture 
heroes all present the same general characteristics. They 
are all described as white, bearded men, generally clad in 
long robes ; appearing suddenly and mysteriously upon 
the scene of their labors, they at once set about improv- 
ing the people by instructing them in useful and orna- 
mental arts, giving them laws, exhorting them to practice 

1 "Native Races," Vol. III., p. 462. 

2 "Myths ot the New World," p. 141. 

3 "Native Races,' Vol. 111., p. 269. 

* "Myths of die New World, 1 " p. 211. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



brotherly love and other Christian virtues, and introduc- 
ing a milder and better form of religion ; having accom- 
plished their mission, they disappear as mysteriously and 
unexpectedly as they came ; and, finally, they were apoth- 
eosized and held in great reverence by a grateful pos- 
terity." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 23. 

The question before us is, Are these traditions warped 
and vague accounts of the coming of the Jaredites and 
Nephites and of their settlement in America? Mormon 
writers insist that they are, but they possess certain fea- 
tures which forbid the application they make of them. 

Elder Stebbins says: "Also traditions assure us that 
the first colonizers were civilized and were white men 
who wore beards." — -Lectures, p. 174. 

But this is one of the very things that these traditions 
do not assure us of. These white and bearded men, 
according to the accounts, were not colonizers of an 
uninhabited wilderness, as the Jaredites and Nephites are 
said to have been, but civilizers of savage and unenlight- 
ened tribes who had preceded them. They all found 
those countries to which they came inhabited. Bancroft, 
speaking of Votan, says: "He was not regarded in the 
native traditions as the first man in America ; he found 
the country peopled, as did all the culture heroes." — 
Native Races, Vol. V., p. 159. Now, if these traditions 
are historical, who were the dark-skinned natives who 
were here before the Jaredites came? Why does the 
Book of Mormon give us no information regarding 
them? It will not do to say that this part of the tradi- 
tions is purely mythical, while that which relates to their 
physical appearance is historical, for it is as general 
throughout all the traditions as the claim that the char- 
acters were white and bearded. 

There are still other features in these myths which 



15^ 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



will net harmonize with the Book of Mormon account. 
Quetzalcoatl is described as bitterly opposed to war and 
violence, as were also Gucumatz and Wixeepecocha, 
which can be said of neither the Jaredites nor Nephites. 
The Votanese could not have been either of the two, for, 
according to their tradition, they founded the empire of 
the Serpents in 955 B. C, twelve centuries too late for 
the Jaredites and eight or ten centuries too early for the 
Nephites. Neither of the great leaders of the Book of 
Mormon peoples, Jared nor Nephi, practiced celibacy 
nor instituted auricular confession. Neither disappeared 
myrtericusly from the summit of Mount Cempoaltepec.. 
Neither was buried where Izamal now stands, like 
Zamna. Neither went into a monastic state at the close 
of their life's work. And neither disappeared in the 
Pacific Ocean. If it is objected that this reasoning is 
arbitrary, I ask, How is it to be determined that these 
minor details are not as historical as the claim that these 
culture heroes were white and bearded? 

Students interpret these traditions in three ways : ( 1 ) 
Some believe that they are vague historical accounts of 
Europeans or Asiatics, who, either accidentally or pur- 
posely, came to our shores in early times, and who after- 
wards either returned or mysteriously disappeared. (2) 
Others conclude that they are wholly mythical and that 
the white and bearded men are simply personifications 
cf the dawn. And (3) still others claim that the cul- 
ture heroes were Indian reformers, of lighter com- 
plexions than their fellows, who appeared for a time 
among the natives, introducing among them advanced 
ideas, and who afterwards disappeared to be deified by 
a grateful posterity. 

I commit myself to no theory. It is possible that 
these myths are, in a limited sense, historical and record 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



153 



the visits of white reformers from the Eastern continent 
in ancient times. However, if this be so, and it is not 
at all likely, their influence could not have been great, 
for at the time of the Discovery the arts, customs, relig- 
ions and languages of the people bore no marks of such 
an impression from the Old World. 

Brinton thinks that these heroes were only person- 
ifications of the dawn. He says that Quetzalcoatl "is a 
pure creation of the fancy, and all his alleged history is 
nothing but a myth." And adds: "Like all the dawn 
heroes, he, too, was represented as of white complexion, 
clothed in long white robes, and, as many of the Aztec 
gods, with a full and flowing beard." — Myths of the 
New World, p. 214. 

But other authors believe that these heroes were real 
persons — Indian reformers — who, after death, were dei- 
fied and made gods. 

Dellenbaugh says of Quetzalcoatl : "He has been fre- 
quently identified with the dawn, but there seems to be 
good reason for believing that he was a real character, 
who became deified as his good deeds passed down to 
successive generations." — North Americans of Yester- 
da y> P- 397- 

Bandelier concludes that this god was "a prominent, 
gifted Indian leader, who certainly preceded the com- 
ing of those Nahuatl tribes" — Aztecs, etc. — "that subse- 
quently formed the valley confederacy, as well as that cf 
the later tribe of Tlaxcallan. The claim to his origin 
accordingly rests between the so-called Toltecs on one 
side and the Olmeca and Xicalanca on the other." — Ibid. 

And Thomas asks : "Is it not possible that these tra- 
ditional personages were priestly messengers traveling 
from tribe to tribe to weld together a common brother- 
hood? Such a supposition would not be more extrava- 



154 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



gant than that theory which makes of them sun and light 
myths." — American Archaeology, p. 363. 

No matter how these traditions may be interpreted, 
they will not harmonize with the Book of Mormon. If 
these culture heroes are only personifications of the 
dawn, as Brinton thinks, or Indian reformers, as Ban- 
delier and others conclude, they afford no support to the 
Book of Mormon account. And even if these traditions 
are to a limited extent historical, they contain radical 
features which can not be made to agree with the history 
of the Jaredites and Xephites. 

Besides the tradition of the origin of her civilization 
previously given, Peru had two other traditions account- 
ing for the introduction of advanced ideas among her 
peoples. According to one, the Sun, taking compassion 
on the degraded condition of the people, sent his two 
children, Manco Capac and his sister-wife, Mama Oello, 
"to gather the natives into communities and teach them 
the arts of civilized life." And, according to another, 
the people were civilized by four brothers who were 
raised from the bosom of Lake Titicaca by Viracocha 
and were given the four points of the compass. 

Baldwin says of Montesinos : "He discards the won- 
der-stories told of Manco Capac and Mama Oello, and 
gives the Peruvian nation a beginning which is at least 
not incredible. It was originated, he says, by a people 
led by four brothers, who settled in the valley of Cuzco, 
and developed civilization there in a very human way. 
The youngest of these brothers assumed supreme 
authority, and became the first of a long line of sov- 
ereigns." — Ancient America, p. 264. 

Mormons are very confident that these four white 
and bearded men were Laman, Lemuel, Sam and Nephi, 
the last the youngest, who became the first of a long 



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155 



line of Nephite kings. "Were not these," the Committee 
ask, "the four brothers, Laman, Lemuel, Sam and Ne- 
phi?" — Report, p. 19. 

But they could not have been, even if real characters, 
for the following reasons : 

1. Their names, as given in the traditions, are Ayar- 
Manco-Topa, Ayar-Cachi-Topa, Ayar-Anca-Topa and 
Ayar-Uchu-Topa, not Laman, Lemuel, Sam and Nephi. 

2. They found the country already inhabited by tribes 
to whom they imparted "the blessings of civilization," 
instead of uninhabited as the Nephites are said to have 
found it. 

3. If Montesinos is correct, they entered the valley of 
Cuzco five hundred years after the deluge, several cen- 
turies too early for Lehi's sons. 

4. According to the "Report of the Committee on 
American Archaeology" (pp. 18, 19), Laman and Lemuel 
had nothing to do with the founding of ancient Peru, 
being a thousand miles to the south in the province of 
Rioja. 

5. The four sons of Lehi, who are said to have been 
at the founding of the city of Nephi (Cuzco), were Sam, 
Nephi, Jacob and Joseph, and the last was a priest, not 
a king. 

Brinton, who is not inclined to take any of these 
accounts literally, says of these brothers : "Their names 
are very variously given, but as they have already been 
identified with the four winds, we can omit their con- 
sideration here." — Myths, p. 212. And this is the most 
reasonable disposal that can be made of them. 

RED-HAIRED MUMMIES. 

Mummies with red or chestnut hair have been dis- 
covered in different parts of America, and in these, it is 



156 



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thought, has been preserved the type of the ancient race. 
These bodies have been taken from the saltpetrous caves 
of Kentucky and Tennessee, from the cliff-houses of the 
Southwest and from the burial-places of Peru. They 
have been preserved by different agencies, by the action 
of certain chemicals in the soil or in the atmosphere of 
the places where they have been deposited, by the cool, 
dry climate or by a primitive but effective process of 
embalment. 

The question before archaeologists is this: Are these 
mummies with auburn hair the bodies of a race different 
from the present American, or is the light color of their 
hair due to the action of certain chemicals found in their 

depositories ? 

The latter is by far the more reasonable explanation 
of the mystery, and has to support it the fact that the 
soils of their burial-places are strongly impregnated with 
lime, saltpeter and other chemicals which have a tendency 
to fade out the color of human hair. 

Short says of the opinion of Jones on the color of 
the mummies from Kentucky and Tennessee: "Pro- 
fessor Jones supposes that the light color of these so- 
called mummies of Tennessee and Kentucky is due to 
the action of lime and saltpeter." — North Americans of 
Antiquity, p. 187. 

And Bradford, in speaking of these mummies and 
also those from Peru, says : "With regard to the color 
of the hair observed upon these bodies" — from Kentucky 
and Tennessee — "it has been unreasonably considered as 
sustaining the theory of the European origin of the 
ancient inhabitants of the west. The probabilities are, 
however, that its original hue was black, and that the 
change to its present appearance is owing to the chemical 
action of the saltpetrous earth in which the bodies were 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



157 



deposited. In corroboration of this view, some human 
remains found in Peruvian sepulchres may be referred 
to; several of these tombs examined in 1790, by the 
Spaniards, contained bodies in an entire condition, but 
withered and dried, and the hair of a red color. From 
their position and other accompanying circumstances, 
they were undoubtedly the remains of the Peruvian 
Indians, the change in the hair having probably arisen 
from the character of its soil, it being impregnated with 
saline matter." — American Antiquities, pp. 31, 32. 

Yet Short, after admitting that "the siliceous sand 
and marl of the plain southward of Arica" — in Peru — 
"where the most remarkable cemeteries are situated, is 
slightly impregnated with common salt as well as nitrate 
and sulphate of soda," still contends that the ancient 
Peruvians were "an auburn-haired race" ! 1 

A most conclusive proof that the light-haired mum- 
mies of America are the bodies of American Indians is 
that they were buried in the same way and in the same 
kinds of sepulchres in which the historic tribes, of the 
localities in which they have been found, buried their 
dead. 

Many of the light-haired mummies from Peru have 
been taken from large towers called chulpas, made of 
rough stone and clay, square, round or rectangular in 
shape, and often over twenty feet high. The bodies 
were wrapped in llama skins, were entombed in a sitting 
posture, and were surrounded by the ornaments and 
utensils which they had made use of during life. But 
these chulpas were not the work of an extinct race, but 
of the Aymaras, a tribe now existing, who practiced this 
mode of burial, according to Las Casas, until after the 

1 "The Book of Mormon Verified," p. 22. 



158 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



Spanish Conquest. Brinton says: "The sepulchral struc- 
tures of the Aymaras also differed from those of the 
Incas. They were not underground vaults, but stone 
structures erected on the surface, with small doors 
throug'h which the corpse was placed in the tomb. They 
were called chulpas, and in construction resembled the 
tolas of the Quitus." — The American Race, p. 220. As 
the mummies from these sepulchres are the bodies of 
Aymara Indians, and as the color of the hair in this tribe 
is naturally black, we are warranted in our conclusion 
that the light color of the hair upon their heads is due 
to external chemical causes. 

From Arica, Peru, and its vicinity, the tombs have 
yielded up a great number of these mummies. The 
burial-places in this locality are of circular form with a 
diameter of from three to five feet and a depth of from 
five to six, and are often surrounded by cromlechs of 
rough stones or are surmounted with mounds. Some of 
the bodies from these sepulchres have been preserved by 
being covered with a resinous substance ; others have 
simply been dried before inhumation. They were seated 
on slabs of stone, with the knees drawn up against the 
breast, and the head resting on the knees, and were 
clothed in coarse linen cloth sewn with cactus thorns, 
and were surrounded by the implements, utensils and 
ornaments which they had made use of during life. 
These consisted of distaffs filled with wool, toys, balls 
of thread, vases, wooden needles, combs and shell money, 
and such provisions for the journey of the soul as maize 
and cocoa leaves. As identically the same kind of sep- 
ulchres has been employed by historic tribes, and as the 
same kinds of ornaments, utensils and implements have 
been used by them, we have two strong links connecting 
these mummies with the race now living. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



159 



The mummies from Kentucky and Tennessee, which 
have been found in the saltpetrous caves of those States, 
also are evidently only the bodies of North American 
Indians. That historic tribes employed these caves as 
depositories for their dead will probably not be denied, 
as their remains have from time to time been found in 
them. 1 These bodies, like those from Peru, were placed 
in a sitting posture and were surrounded by implements 
of agriculture, hunting and warfare, and were dressed 
and ornamented exactly as the North American Indians 
dressed and ornamented their dead. The articles found 
with these bodies were bows and arrows, pottery, fishing- 
nets, cloths, mats, cane baskets, beads, wooden cups, 
bark moccasins, turkey feather fans, dressed deerskins, 
and other things of like character, showing that they 
belonged to a primitive hunter race and not to a civilized 
people like the Nephites. 2 When we come to consider 
that in no way but in color of hair did these mummies 
differ from the Cherokees and other tribes which inhab- 
ited this territory at the time of its settlement by the 
whites, and that the chemicals found in these very caves 
will change the hair from black to sorrel or foxy, there 
is no good reason for believing that these mummies be- 
longed to any other but the red race. 

On the light-haired mummies from the country of 
the Cliff Dwellers, Elder Stebbins writes as follows : 
"When at the World's Fair last summer I saw some 
relics of that people. The professor who had charge 
made plain the difference between the skulls of the Cliff 
Dwellers and those of the Indians, showing the remark- 
able similarity between the heads of the Cliff Dwellers 
and the heads of the Caucasian race to-day. Also in the 



1 "Cherokees in Pre-Columbian Times," p. 35. 

2 "American Antiquities," p. 30, 31. 



i6o 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Utah Building I saw a mummy, a well-preserved mummy 
of a Cliff Dweller ; and upon all the skulls the hair was 
as fine as the hair of the white people of our time, and 
some was both fine and light colored. Indian hair is all 
dark, all coarse. The skulls were shaped like the skulls 
of white people, a very distinct and different people from 
the Indians." — Lectures, pp. 103, 104. 

But Mr. Stebbins' conclusions are not shared by the 
greater body of archaeologists to-day. When we come 
to examine carefully these light-haired mummies and the 
evidences of their antiquity, culture and relationship, we 
find nothing to justify the conclusion that they represent 
a race distinct from the Pueblos and kindred tribes which 
now inhabit those parts. Even if it should be proved that 
the natural color of their hair was light, it would not 
establish their connection with the Caucasian race, for, 
as we have seen, the tribes of that locality are noted for 
the great number of light-haired individuals which they 
have among them, while some have skulls that are very 
well formed. And even if the bodies of white men should 
be found in the cliff dwellings, it should cause no sur- 
prise, for it is now known that the Cliff Dwellers were 
here as late as the year 1735 A. D. As Coronado first 
visited the "Seven Cities of Cibola" in 1540, we have 
nearly two hundred years during which white men might 
have been adopted among this people and their dead 
bodies deposited in their burial-places. I do not state 
this as a fact, but suggest it as a possibility. 

Some Mormons claim that the Cliff Dwellers were 
the Gadianton robbers spoken of in the Book of Mormon 
who fled to the mountain fastnesses in order to escape 
the hand of the law, and who sallied forth from time to 
time to plunder the peaceable Nephites. "These bands 
of robbers," says Elder Phillips, "are frequently men- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



161 



tioned in the Book of Mormon ; they lived in the time of 
the later civilization, the Nephites, and their remains are 
doubtless the same that are known now as 'ruins of the 
Cliff Dwellers,' which are found in a variety of places." 
— Book of Mormon Verified, p. 25. 

But this claim is met by the undeniable fact that the 
Cliff Dwellers were net warlike freebooters, but peace- 
able agriculturists, who built their houses and grain-bins 
in the cliffs to protect themselves and their possessions 
from savage marauders, of whom, it is certain, the 
Apaches were a tribe. 

Mr. Stebbins is not so certain on the nationality of 
the Cliff Dwellers as Mr. Phillips, and admits that he 
does not knew whether they were Jaredites or Nephites, 
but adds : "Only their remains are found ; but all unite in 
saying that they were altogether different from any of 
the tribes of Indians that were in North America, or that 
even dwelt in Mexico or Central America, at least in any 
recent age." — Lectures, p. 104. 

It is amazing with what ease and satisfaction Mor- 
mon writers make claims which they know, or ought 
to know, are utterly at variance with the established facts 
of archaeology. Had Mr. Stebbins given the subject the 
critical study that it deserves, he never would have writ- 
ten as he did, for "all" do not unite in saying that the 
Cliff Dwellers were different from the Indian tribes of 
Central America, Mexico and the United States. I have 
taken the pains to read a number of works on the sub- 
ject, and have found that the opinion that the Cliff Dwell- 
ers were the direct ancestors of the Pueblos and kindred 
tribes is held by the very great majority of our archaeolo- 
gists to-day, instead of the theory that they were a white 
race of foreign extraction. In support of this, I now 
give a number of quotations from the works of leading 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



archaeologists. These explode the theory that the Cliff 
Dwellers were blue-eyed, blond-haired Gadiantons. 

"As already stated, it appears certain that the Cliff 
Dwellers and the inhabitants of the pueblos belonged to 
the same race, and that this did not materially differ 
from the Moquis and Zunis of the present day." — Pre- 
historic America, p. 255. 

"Not omy do the ruins of this group bear no resem- 
blance to those of the south, but they represent in all 
respects buildings like those still inhabited by the Pueblo 
tribes and the Moquis, and do not differ more among 
themselves than do the dwellings of the peoples men- 
tioned. Every one of them may be most reasonably 
regarded as the work of the direct ancestors of the pres- 
ent inhabitants of the Pueblo towns, who did not differ 
to any great extent in civilization or institutions from 
their descendants, though they may very likely have been 
vastly superior to them in power and wealth. Conse- 
quently there is not a single relic in the whole region 
that requires the agency of any extinct race of people, 
or any other nations, . . . than those now living in the 
country." — Native Races, Vol. IV., pp. 683, 684. 

"I would emphatically say that there is nothing in 
any of the remains of the pueblos, or the cliff houses, 
or any other antiquities in that portion of our continent, 
which compels us to seek other constructors for them 
than the ancestors of the various tribes which were found 
on the spot by the Spaniards in the sixteenth century, 
and by the armies of the United States in the middle of 
the nineteenth. This opinion is in accordance with his- 
tory, with the traditions of the tribes themselves, and 
with the condition of culture in which they were found." 
— The American Race, p. 115. 

"I have included the Pueblo Indians of North Amer- 



CUM O RAH REVISITED 



163 



ica under the type of Asiatic Americans. There is little 
room for doubt that they are descendants of the builders 
of the cliff dwellings, which have been so happily de- 
scribed and illustrated by Jackson and Holmes, in con- 
nection with Dr. Hayden's survey of the Territories."- — 
Preadamites, pp. 340, 341. 

"There is not much room left to doubt that the 
present Pueblo Indians are the direct descendants cf 
the ancient inhabitants of southern Colorado and New 
Mexico." — Dr. E. Bess els, Ibid, p. 161. 

"There is no warrant whatever for the old assump- 
tion that the 'cliff dwellers' were a separate race, and 
the cliff dwellings must be regarded as only a phase of 
pueblo architecture." — Cosmos Mindeleff, in 16th Ann. 
Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno., p. 191. 

"The kinship of Cliff Dwellers and Pueblos was 
long ago recognized by ethnologists, both from resem- 
blances of skulls, the character of architecture and ar- 
chaeological objects found in each class of dwellings." — 
/. W. Fewkes, in ijth Ann. Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno., p. 
532. 

"The ancient peoples of the San Juan country were 
doubtless the ancestors of the present Pueblo tribes of 
New Mexico and Arizona." — W. H. Holmes, Ibid, p. 
532. 

"It appears to be generally conceded that the modern 
Pueblo Indians are descendants of the cliff dwellers and 
people who built the clustered villages on the mesas and 
plateaus which have been mentioned." — American Ar- 
chaeology, p. 229. 

"Directing our attention now to still another region, 
we find in the Southwest a vast deal that is absorbingly 
interesting. Fortunately, the people were, many of them, 
still there when the first Spaniards came into the country 



164 



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in 1540, so that we have data to prevent the attributing 
the works found there to some mysterious race. It has 
been attempted in the case of the 'Cliff dwellers,' but the 
investigations of competent ethnologists have effectually 
settled that matter, and checked the romantic tendency 
except in the case of a few who will not learn." — North 
Americans of Yesterday, p. 176. 

Lumholtz found in the wild and uninhabited regions 
of the Sierra Madre, in Chihuahua, a number of impos- 
ing remains of the Cliff Dwellers. These consisted of 
buildings of stone perched on the mountain-tops and 
often surrounded by fortifications, cavate structures, 
often three stories high and provided with windows and 
doors, and stone terraces built across narrow glens. 
Burial caves, containing mummies, were also discovered. 
These mummies bore a wonderful likeness to the Moki 
Indians. Thomas speaks of them as follows : "These 
mummies, some of which still retained the hair and eye- 
brows, are of low stature, and bear a marked resem- 
blance to the Moki Indians, who, as well as the Zunis, 
have a tradition that their ancestors came from the 
south." — American Archaeology, p. 222. 

And still further, as identifying the Cliff Dwellers 
with present existing tribes, we have the identity between 
their implements, utensils, ornaments and articles of food 
and those of the Pueblos. Nordenskiold, while making 
an exploration in the vicinity of the "Step House," on 
the Mesa Verde, discovered a number of graves contain- 
ing mortuary remains. These remains consisted of eight 
bodies, partly or wholly mummified, buried in shallow 
excavations with their knees drawn up against their 
breasts, and with them such articles and materials as 
bowls, mugs, osier matting, arrow shafts, cornhusks, 
pieces of flint, a basketful of cornmeal and the entire 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



shell of a pumpkin. A visitor at a Pueblo village two 
centuries ago would have seen such articles in actual use. 

That a number of the cliff dwellings have been de- 
serted since the coming of the Europeans is established 
beyond question or doubt. When the Spaniards first 
visited that part of the country the towns on the southern 
Gila and its tributaries were abandoned, while those far- 
ther north were found by Coronado to be in a somewhat 
flourishing condition. In 1735 the Cliff Dwellers were 
still in existence, for in that year Pedro de Ainza led an 
expedition from Santa Fe against the Navajos and dis- 
covered a people living in stone houses /'built within the 
rocks" and guarded by stone watch-towers. And with 
this the traditions of the natives agree. Brinton declares 
that the Apaches still retain a tradition of having driven 
out the Cliff Dwellers, and that one of their gentes is 
named from them "stone-house people." 1 

On the contrary, Mr. Stebbins declares : "As for the 
age in which the Cliff Dwellers lived there is no clew to 
it. Neither the Spaniard nor any other European found 
even one living person of the race; none have been seen, 
and no tradition reaches back to the days of the Cliff 
Dwellers."' — Lectures, p. 104. 

Like many another of his assertions, it takes but little 
investigation to discover its falsity. 

AMERICAN CRANIOLOGY. 

It is claimed that there is a superiority in the struc- 
ture and shape of the crania of the ancient Americans 
over those of the Indian race ; that the former indicate 
an intellectuality on the part of the ancient races that the 
latter do not possess. Mr. Stebbins asserts : "There ap- 
pears to be abundant proof of the superiority of the 



1 "The American Race," p. 115, 



i66 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



ancient Americans in color, in skull structure and shape, 
and as to the fineness and light shades of hair." — Lec- 
tures, p. 176. 

But this is only another of Mr. Stebbins' baseless 
assertions, for craniometry does not reveal a superiority 
of the ancient American skulls over those of the existing 
race, but clearly establishes that in skull structure and 
shape the ancient Americans were precisely like those 
now living. 

On certain skulls found in California, Illinois, Argen- 
tina and Brazil, which have been credited with a very 
high antiquity, Brinton writes : "All these are credited 
with an antiquity going back nearly to the close of the 
last glacial period, and are the oldest yet found on the 
continent. They prove to be strictly analogous to those 
of the Indians of the present day." — The American Race, 
p. 36. 

The peculiarities of these crania, and those in which 
they conform to those of the present native population, 
are wide malar arches, low orbital indices, medium nasal 
apertures and broad faces. 1 

In connection with his own, Brinton gives the con- 
clusion of the distinguished Swiss anatomist, Dr. J. Koll- 
man, which is that "the variety of man in America at the 
close of the glacial period had the same facial form as 
the Indian of to-day, and the racial traits which distin- 
guish him now, did also at that time." 

And this is the opinion of the learned Charles Dar- 
win, based upon the report of Dr. Lund concerning cer- 
tain skulls from the caves of Brazil. He says that a 
naturalist would hear "on the authority of an excellent 
observer, Dr. Lund, that the human skulls found in the 



*"The American Race," p. 36. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



caves of Brazil, entombed with many extinct mammals, 
belonged to the same type as that now prevailing 
throughout the American continent." — Descent of Man, 
pp. 164, 165. 

But not only are these peculiar cranial characteristics, 
which in a very general way, when taken together, may 
be said to distinguish the American from the other races, 
traceable to a remote antiquity, but the very diversities 
that now exist have always existed. Craniologists, ac- 
cording to their measurements, divide human crania into 
three classes : brachycephalic, mesocephalic and dolico- 
cephalic. The proportional measurement of a skull is 
called its cephalic index, which is the ratio between its 
width and length, taken antero-posteriorily. If the width 
of the skull is 78 per cent., or over, of its length, it is 
said to be brachycephalic, or short-headed; if it is be- 
tween 78 per cent, and 74 per cent., it is mesocephalic, or 
middle-headed; and if it is 74 per cent., or under, it is 
dolicocephalic, or long-headed. These various types of 
crania have existed contemporaneously and not consecu- 
tively, and it is far from the truth to say that the ancient 
Americans were of one type and that the Indians are of 
another. 

A few facts relative to American crania will set this 
matter before the reader in its proper light. 

Of the oldest American skulls that have been dis- 
covered that from Argentina is brachycephalic, while 
those from Brazil are dolicocephalic. That the latter are 
skulls of the present American race Brinton affirms: 
"The skulls and human bones which were discovered by 
Dr. Lund in the caves of Lagoa Santa in immediate 
juxtaposition to those of animals now extinct, came from 
a region occupied by the Tapuyas, and are in all respects 
parallel to those of the tribe to-day. This would assign 



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them a residence on the spot far back in the present geo- 
logic period." — The American Race, p. 237. 

The ancient peoples of Peru possessed skulls of vary- 
ing type. Of 245 crania from that country in the Acad- 
emy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, 168 are brachy- 
cephalic, 50 are dolicocephalic and 27 are mesocephalic. 
Of thirteen from near Arica all are dolicocephalic except 
one. And ninety-three out of 104 from Pachacamac are 
brachycephalic, the rest being mescocephalic. 1 

The same diversity exists among mound crania. 
Thus, of two skulls from one burial-place, found by Put- 
nam, one is brachycephalic and the other is dolicocephalic. 
Of eight skulls from the Red River mound three are 
bracycephalic. Three out of four crania from Chambers' 
Island, Wisconsin, are also short. Out of ten from 
Fort Wayne one is long and the rest are either short or 
intermediate. Of sixty-seven examined by Carr, which 
were taken from the stone-graves of Tennessee, 19 are 
brachycephalic, 5 are dolicocephalic, 18 are mesocephalic 
and 15 are artificially depressed. Moorehead took from 
Hopewell's Earthworks, Ohio, sixty-nine skeletons, of 
which 30 were short-headed, 10 long-headed, 4 inter- 
mediate and the remainder so far decayed that the ceph- 
alic index could not be obtained, 2 and he states that in 
the mound-building and stone-grave areas of Ohio cra- 
nial forms "as wide apart as those of the Caucasian and 
Ethiopian are not uncommon." 3 And from the aborig- 
inal cemetery near Madisonville, Ohio, come fourteen 
hundred crania, of which twelve hundred are brachy- 
cephalic and the remainder dolicocephalic. 4 Thus we 

1 "The American Race," p. 210. 

2 "Primitive Man in Ohio," p. 222. 

3 "Primitive Man in Ohio," p. 206. 
* "Primitive Man in Ohio," o. 210. 



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169 



see that among the ancient inhabitants all types of skull, 
both high and low, were to be observed. 

But identically the same variations are observed 
among existing tribes. The Mayas of Yucatan are 
brachycephalic , their neighbors, the Otomies, are mark- 
edly dolicocephalic. 1 Among the Iroquois and Cherokees 
dolicocephalism prevails, while their congeners, the Hu- 
rons, are prevailingly brachycephalic. 2 The Yumas are 
generally short-headed, but their crania have been found 
with a cephalic index as low as sixty-eight. 3 And Brin- 
ton informs us that of seventy-seven Algonkin crania in 
the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, 53 are 
dolicocephalic, 14 mesencephalic and 10 brachycephalic* 

By these facts we observe that not only those features 
common to the American crania of the present day are 
traceable to the remotest antiquity, but that even the 
existing diversities may be followed back to the earliest 
period. And this clearly refutes Mr. Stebbins' baseless 
claim that the ancient Americans were superior to our 
modern Indians in "skull structure and shape." 

Even those who have held that the 'veritable Mound 
Builders" were a race superior to the North American 
Indians have been forced to concede that their crania are 
of the Indian type. 

Foster says : "Hitherto our knowledge of the Mound 
Builders' crania has been exceedingly scant — restricted 
to less than a dozen specimens — which, if authentic, 
clearly indicate for the most part the Indian type." — ■ 
Prehistoric Races, p. 275. 

Bancroft says : "Very few skulls or bones are recov- 

1 "The American Race," pp. 135, 136. 

2 "The American Race,'' p. 81. 

3 "The American Race," p. 38. 
* "The American Race," p. 75. 



I/O 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



ered sufficiently entire to give any idea of the Mound 
Builders' physique, and these few show no clearly de- 
fined differences from the modern Indian tribes." — Na- 
tive Races, Vol. IV., p. 775. 

And J. C. Nott, speaking of the Choctaws, says: 
"They present heads precisely analogous to those ancient 
crania taken from the mounds over the whole territory 
of the United States; while they most strikingly contrast 
with the Anglo-Saxons, French, Spaniards and negroes, 
among whom they are moving." — Types of Mankind, 
p. 289. 

These statements come to us with the force of con- 
cessions from men who have believed that the Mound 
Builders were people distinct from the tribes of North 
American Indians. 

Indian skulls have been found that exceed in capacity 
the skulls of the ancient American races. The average 
cubical capacity of the Parisian cranium is 1,448 cubic 
centimeters; that of the American Indian, 1,376, and 
that of the negro, 1,344. "But," says Brinton, "single 
examples of Indian skulls have yielded the extraordinary 
capacity of 1,747, 1,825 and even 1,920 cubic centimeters, 
which are not exceeded in any other race." — The Ameri- 
can Race, p. 39. 

When we come to compare these skulls with those of 
the ancient Peruvians from along the coast — from Arica, 
Chacota and adjacent territory, from which localities 
many of the light-haired mummies come — which average 
but 1,230 cubic centimeters, which is a low T er capacity 
than that of the crania of the Bushmen and Hottentots, 
we are strongly impressed that some at least of the 
ancient "civilized people" were inferior "in skull struc- 
ture and shape" to some of the modern "savage tribes." 

The reader will have observed by this time that the 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



171 



evidences adduced by the Mormons to prove that the 
ancient Americans were white are purely inferential, and 
that their inferences are drawn from some very uncer- 
tain sources. The tribes of "white Indians" are far from 
white, being only of a lighter copper color than their 
fellows and possess no features in art, culture or religion 
Avhich would link them to the Nephites. As for the tradi- 
tions of "white and bearded men," it is not at all certain 
that they are historical, but even if they are vaguely so 
the characters which they present could have been neither 
the Jaredites nor Nephites, for invariably they are de- 
scribed as civilizers of barbarous tribes who had pre- 
ceded them, and not colonizers of uninhabited wilder- 
nesses. The light hair of some of the American mum- 
mies is shown to be, with great probability, due to the 
mineral ingredients in the soils of their burial-places, 
while the articles found with them and their manner of 
burial indicate that they belonged to the Indian race. 
And, lastly, a close and careful comparison of the Amer- 
ican crania reveals the fact that the present distinctive- 
cranial features, with the existing diversities, are trace- 
able to a very remote period in the past. Not a single 
fact can be produced to prove that another race, or other 
races, besides the red, inhabited this continent during 
those centuries in which Mormons claim it was inhabited 
by the Jaredites and Nephites. ■ 

I close this chapter with the following quotation from 
Brinton : "These very ancient remains prove that in all 
important craniologic indicia the earliest Americans, 
those who were contemporaries of the fossil horse and 
other long since extinct quadrupeds, possessed the same 
racial character as the natives of the present day, with 
similar skulls and a like physiognomy. We reach, there- 
fore, the momentous conclusion that the American race 



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throughout the whole continent, and from its earliest 
appearance in time, is and has been one, as distinct in 
type as any other race, and from its isolation probably 
the purest of all in its racial traits." — Essays of an Amer- 
icanist, p. 40. 



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173 



CHAPTER IV. 

Are the American Indians of Jewish Descent? — History of the 
Theory — What Mormons Claim — Jewish Analogies — Facts 
Fatal to the Theory. 

The theory that the American Indians are descend- 
ants of the children of Israel was profoundly entertained 
by some of the most learned and most pious men of this 
country a century ago, and the number of analogies they 
pointed out between the two peoples is not exceeded by 
the number pointed out between the Indians and any 
other race. 

Bancroft remarks : "The theory that the Americans 
are of Jewish descent has been discussed more minutely 
and at greater length than any other. Its advocates, or 
at least those of them who have made original researches, 
are comparatively few ; but the extent of their investiga- 
tions and the multitude of the parallelisms they adduce 
in support of their hypothesis, exceed by far anything 
we have yet encountered." — Native Races, Vol. V., pp. 
77, 78. 

The first to advance this theory were a number of the 
Spanish priests of Mexico, of whom Garcia was the most 
scholarly. He claimed to find evidence sustaining it in 
the similarities between the Indians and the Jews in 
character, dress, religion, physical peculiarities, condition 
and custom. Both, he declares, were liars, despicable, 
cruel, boastful, idle, dirty, turbulent, incorrigible and 
vicious. Both were slow to believe. Both showed a lack 
of charity to the poor, sick and unfortunate. Both were 
naturally give to idolatry. Both raised their hands to 
heaven in making an affirmation. Both buried their dead 



174 



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on hills without their cities. Both rent their clothing 
upon hearing bad tidings. Both gave a kiss on the cheek 
as a token of peace. Both celebrated their victories with 
songs and dances. Both drowned dogs in wells. And 
both practiced crucifixion. 1 These analogies are certainly 
absurd enough, yet they compare favorably with those 
that the Mormons adduce to prove the same theory. 

The first Englishman to advocate the Jewish descent 
of the American Indians was Rev. T. Thorowgood, 
whose work, "Jewes in America, or Probabilities that the 
Americans are of That Race," was published in London 
in 1650. The following year it was replied to by Sir 
Hamon L'Estrange, in his "Americans No Jewes." 

William Penn was also of this opinion, and wrote the 
following to the Free Society of Traders of London in 
1683 : "I am ready to believe them of the Jewish race — 
I mean of the stock of the ten tribes — and that for the 
following reasons : First, they were to go to a land not 
planted or known" — see 2 Esdras 13:40-45 — "which, to 
be sure, Asia and Africa were, if not Europe, and he that 
intended that extraordinary judgment upon them might 
make the passage not uneasy to them, as it is not impos- 
sible in itself, from the eastermost parts of Asia to the 
westermost parts of America. In the next place, I find 
them of a like countenance, and their children of so lively 
resemblance that a man would think himself in Duke's 
Place, or Berry Street, London, when he seeth them. But 
this is not all ; they agree in wrights, they reckon by 
moons, they offer their firstfruits, they have a kind of 
feast of tabernacles, they are said to lay their altar upon 
twelve stones, their mourning a year, customs of women, 
with many other things, that do not now occur." 

1 "Native Races," Vol. V., p. 80. 



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175 



One of the first Americans to advocate the Jewish 
descent of the American Indians, was James Adair, in his 
"American Indians," London, 1775. He had been a 
trader among the tribes of the southeastern part of the 
United States for forty years, and wrote much from his 
own observations. In many respects his work is both com- 
mendable and valuable. Jewish rites, customs, beliefs and 
institutions which he claimed to find among the Indians 
are: "1. Their division into tribes. 2. Their worship of 
Jehovah. 3. Their notions of a theocracy. 4. Their be- 
lief in the administration of angels. 5. Their language 
and dialects. 6. Their manner of counting time. 7. Their 
prophets and high priests. 8. Their festivals, fasts and 
religious rites. 9. Their daily sacrifice. 10. Their ablu- 
tions and anointings. 11. Their laws of uncleanliness. 
12. Their abstinence from unclean things. 13. Their 
marriage, divorces and punishments of adultery. 14. 
Their several punishments. 15. Their cities of refuge. 
16. Their purifications and preparatory ceremonies. 17. 
Their ornaments. 18. Their manner of curing the sick. 
19. Their burial of the dead. 20. Their mourning for the 
dead. 21. Their raising seed to a deceased brother. 22. 
Their change of names adapted to their circumstances 
and times. 23. Their own traditions ; the account of 
English writers; and the testimonies given by Spaniards 
and other writers of the primitive inhabitants of Mexico 
and Peru." — Book of Mormon Lectures, p. 245. 

Among other Americans who held this theory were 
the Indian missionaries, Mayhew and Eliot, Elias Bou- 
dinot, Rev. Ethan Smith, Dr. Jarvis and Josiah Priest. 
Boudinot's work, "Star in the West," appeared in 1816; 
Smith's "View of the Hebrews" in 1820, and Priest's 
"American Antiquities" in 1833. This last-named work 
is still a standard with the Latter-day Saints, if not with 



176 



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archaeologists, although from being a work on antiquities 
it has become an antiquity itself. George Catlin has also 
expressed the opinion that the American Indians have 
Jewish blood in their veins, though he does not claim 
that they are either Jews or the "lost tribes." He speaks 
of them as an amalgam race and thinks that they have 
descended from the Jews crossed with a primitive stock. 
And George Jones, in his "History of Ancient America," 
holds that the inhabitants of North America, but of 
North America alone, and the "lost tribes" are identical. 

But by far the most scholarly and illustrious advocate 
of the Jewish theory was Lord Kingsbo rough, an Irish 
nobleman, whose work, "Mexican Antiquities," published 
in nine volumes, in London, from 183 1 to 1848, is, laying 
aside his theory, deserving of much commendation. Ban- 
croft says of him: "Kingsborough has a theory to prove, 
and to accomplish his object he drafts every shadow of 
an analogy into his service. But though his theory is as 
wild as the wildest, and his proofs are as vague as the 
vaguest, yet Lord Kingsborough can not be classed with 
such writers as Jones, Ranking, Cabrera, Adair, and the 
host of other dogmatists who have fought tooth and nail, 
each for his particular hobby. Kingsborough was an 
enthusiast — a fanatic, if you choose — but his enthusiasm 
is never offensive." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 84. 1 

According to these authors, the ten tribes, or a portion 

1 I have succeeded in getting hold of a single work on this subject 
outside of those written by Mormons. This work is "The Ten Tribes of 
Israel; or, The True History of the North American Indians, Showing 
that They are the Descendants of These Ten Tribes," by Mr. Timothy 
Jenkins, published in Springfield, O., in 1883. Although this book has been 
put before the public more recently than the works of most of the writers 
on this theory, it abounds in the same curious analogies, imaginary simi- 
larities and unfounded inferences that characterize the rest. It is a 
cheap compilation of the notions ~nd assertions of Adair and others, with 
the author's ideas interspersed. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



177 



of them, left Assyria, where they had been carried cap- 
tive, traversed the continent of Asia, crossed the Behring 
Strait, and, traveling down the Pacific Coast, established 
a Jewish civilization in Mexico and Central America. 

But this theory, so widely entertained a century ago, 
has no learned defenders to-day. It belongs to the past, 
has been left behind in the onward march of scientific 
research, and is looked upon as one of those ludicrous 
fancies upon which men have expended so much zeal 
with so much satisfaction to themselves and so little to 
succeeding generations. The attitude of later writers 
toward this theory is expressed in the following extracts 
from their works : 

"One of these theories is (or was) that the original 
civilizers of Mexico and Central America were the 'lost 
ten tribes of Israel.' This extremely remarkable explana- 
tion of the mystery was devised very early, and it has 
been persistently defended by some persons, although 
nothing can be more unwarranted or more absurd. . . . 
This wild notion, called a theory, scarcely deserves so 
much attention. It is a lunatic fancy, possible only to 
men of a certain class, which in our time does not 
multiply." — Ancient America, pp. 166, 167. 

"It is hardly necessary at this day to advert to a belief 
which was profoundly entertained a century ago, except 
as an evidence of the progress of ethnological knowl- 
edge." — Prehistoric Races, p. 323. 

"The notion that the Indians are descendants of the 
Israelites is absurd." — Ridpath's History of the United 
States, p. 41. 

"But all such theories of the origin of the American 
races from an Israelitish stock, or from a Cymric or a 
Gaelic, may be safely dismissed as the fruits of mis- 
guided enthusiasm and perverted ingenuity."— Mr. A. T. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Rice, in the Introduction to Charnay's Ancient Cities of 
the New World. 

"There has been a vast amount of discussion relative 
to the ten lost tribes of Israel. The literature upon this 
subject is extensive and somewhat amusing as well as 
absurd." — The Mound Builders, p. 139. 

"The wildest as well as the most diverse hypotheses 
were brought forward and defended with great display 
of erudition. One of the most curious was that which 
advanced the notion that the Americans were descendants 
of the ten 'lost tribes of Israel.' No one at present would 
acknowledge himself a believer in this theory ; but it has 
not proved useless, as we owe to it the publication of 
several most valuable works." — The American Race, p. 
18. 

"As for the Lost-Tribes-of-Israel theory, on which 
Kingsborough was wrecked, no archaeologist of to-day 
would be willing to give it a second thought." — North 
Americans of Y ester day , p. 429. 

The Book of Mormon presents this theory, but with 
two important differences. It claims that only a remnant 
of Israel, in which Manasseh, Judah and possibly other 
tribes were represented, came to America; and that, in- 
stead of coming by way of Behring Strait, they entered 
our continent at two different points, the Nephites land- 
ing somewhere on the west coast of South America and 
the Mulokites near the Isthmus of Panama. 

For confirmation of the Book of Mormon account, 
Latter-day Saints appeal to the Old Testament Scriptures 
in which it is claimed reference is made to the book itself, 
to the continent of America, to the people who inhabited 
it, to their emigration from Asia and to the coming out 
of the book and the religious movement connected with 
its appearance. They assert that the Book of Mormon is 



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179 



called "the book that is sealed" (Isa. 29: 11), the "stick 
of Ephraim" (Ezek. 37: 15-20), and the "great things of 
my law" (Hos. 8: 12). That the continent of America 
is called the "midst of the earth" (Gen. 48:16), the 
"land shadowing with wings" (Isa. 18:1), and the 
"mountain in the height of Israel" (Ezek. 17: 23). That 
to reach it the people were to "run over the wall" (Gen. 
49:22), go "over the sea" (Isa. 16:8), and "flee," get 
"far off," "dwell deep" and go "unto the wealthy nation, 
that dwelleth without care, saith the Lord, which have 
neither gates nor bars, which dwell alone" (Jer. 49:30- 
32). And that the record of this people was to "speak 
out of the ground" (Isa. 29:4), and "spring out of the 
earth" (Ps. 85 : 11) ; that a few of its words were to be 
delivered to a "learned" man (Professor Anthon) to 
read, who was to say, "I cannot, for it is sealed;" that the 
book was to be delivered to one "not learned" (Joseph 
Smith), who was to reply, "I am not learned," and that 
following this the Lord was to do a "marvelous work and 
a wonder" among a people who were to draw near him 
with their mouths and with their lips honor him while 
their hearts were removed far from him (Isa. 29: 11-14). 
Thus, by associating together in a certain relation pas- 
sages which have not the slightest reference to the sub- 
ject, but which may be so applied, a plausible story is 
constructed by which the unlearned and credulous are 
deceived. Shakespeare very truly wrote : 

" In religion, 
What damned error but some sober brow- 
Will ble?s it, and approve it with a text, 
Hiding the gro^sness with fair ornament?" 

Mormon writers, in their attempt to trace the Ameri- 
can Indians back to a Jewish origin, having no positive 
proof upon which to rely, have fallen back upon the 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



analogies, similarities and resemblances which have been 
pointed out between the two peoples, not considering that 
such are more often due to human instinct and similar 
environment than to contact or relationship. These anal- 
ogies, similarities and resemblances are taken from the 
works of such earlier writers as Adair, Boudinot, Smith 
and Priest, and are merely stated in Mormon works, not 
elaborated upon, for a truthful elaboration would make 
their forcelessness and ludicrousness so apparent that the 
theory they are intended to prove would not be believed. 

. Orson Pratt points out the following analogies be- 
tween the American Indians and the Jews in order to 
sustain the claim of the Book of Mormon that the former 
are of Israelitish origin: "But in America we do truly 
find several hundred nations of people who do not exhibit 
that diversity of character which we find distinguishing 
the nations of the eastern world. Their color, their fea- 
tures, their general physiognomy, their traditions, their 
manners and customs, their dialects, their general char- 
acteristics of mind, and modes of living — all proclaim that 
they are descended from one common origin. While their 
religious worship, their belief in one God, their computa- 
tion of time by the ceremonies of the new moon, their 
having an ark of the covenant, their erection of a temple 
similar to the Jewish temple, their erection of altars, their 
divisions of the year into four seasons corresponding to 
the Jewish festivals, their laws of sacrifices, their ablu- 
tions and marriages, their places of refuge, their manner 
of conducting war, their abstaining from eating certain 
things forbidden by the laws of Moses, and the numerous 
affinities of their language to the Hebrew — all testify 
loudly that they are of Israelitish origin." — O. Pratt's 
Works, p. 211. 

There are two important facts that these theorists 



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181 



persistently ignore. First, that there are as close simi- 
larities between the Indians and other peoples in lan- 
guage, religion and custom, as there are between the 
Indians and the children of Israel. And, second, that 
more than to counterbalance these analogies, there are 
peculiarities in the American languages, religions and 
customs which can not be harmonized with this theory 
of descent. It has long been conceded by ethnologists 
that analogies can not be considered positive evidence 
of a connection between nation and nation, for it is a 
well-known fact that peoples wholly unrelated and having 
had no contact with one another very often possess strik- 
ing similarities in habit, custom and rite. The Zulus of 
South Africa, for instance, who are in no way related to 
the tribes of Israel, are known to possess a number of 
customs strikingly Jewish, such as the observance of their 
feast of firstfruits, their raising up seed to a deceased 
brother, etc. These close similarities have caused no 
little comment among travelers. Analogies, therefore, 
are not first proof of the relationship of nations and 
peoples, but, when such a relationship is indicated by 
well-defined traditions, the structure of language, etc., 
they may be considered as cumulative evidence to 
strengthen the theory. As the structure of the American 
languages is wholly different from that of the Hebrew, 
and as there is nothing in any of the American traditions 
to indicate their derivation from the Hebrew stock, we 
may say that the analogies pointed out by Mormon 
writers to prove that the American Indians are descend- 
ants of the Jews are wholly without value as proof 

On the impossibility of proving the relationship of 
two nations by analogies in custom, rite, institution and 
belief Latham remarks : "To tell an inquirer who wishes 
to deduce one population from another that certain dis- 



182 



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tant tribes agree with the one under discussion in certain 
points of resemblance, is as irrelevant as to tell a lawyer 
in search of the next of kin to a client deceased that, 
though you know of no relations, you can find a man who 
is the very picture of him in person — a fact good enough 
in itself, but not to the purpose." — Man and His Migra- 
tions, pp. 74, 75. 

On the same point Bancroft says : ''But analogies, 
even when fairly drawn, are by no means conclusive evi- 
dence. So much depends upon the environment of a 
people that a similarity in that particular is of itself suf- 
ficient to account for most of the resemblances which 
have been discovered between the customs, religion and 
traditions of the Americans, and those of Old World 
nations." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 5. 

And Foster observes : "To undertake to trace ethnic 
relations between widely separated peoples, by similarity 
of manners and customs, is an uncertain guide. Man, 
apart from his improvable reason, has what we call, in 
the higher animals, instinct ; and as the beaver every- 
where constructs his dam according to a definite plan, so 
will man perform certain acts instinctively, after a certain 
manner. Hence, among barbarous nations, we may ex- 
pect to find a similarity of manners and customs, without 
necessarily supposing that they are the result of inherit- 
ance." — Prehistoric Races, p. 310. 

As we examine the analogies in rite, institution, cus- 
tom, habit and belief, which are cited by the Mormons to 
prove the account in the Book of Mormon, the truthful- 
ness of these statements will become apparent, for most 
of the rites, institutions, customs, habits and beliefs of 
the American Indians are wholly unlike the rites, institu- 
tions, customs, habits and beliefs of ancient Israel, while 
the few that are said to possess Jewish features are so 



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183 



faintly similar as to need a liberal amount of touching 
up to make these features recognizable. Of the latter 
some are not exclusively Jewish, but are to be found 
among other nations and peoples. Others are purely 
local, found among but few of the tribes. While still 
others have been made out of whole cloth. When care- 
fully and conscientiously examined they prove to be very 
unsatisfactory evidence, if they can be called evidence 
at all. 

DIVISION INTO TRIBES. 

It is claimed that the American Indians are divided 
into tribes like the children of Israel ; hence that they 
must be of Israelitish descent. This is about the first 
argument presented by the Mormons to prove their 
theory. Timothy Jenkins, who is not a Latter-day Saint, 
but who holds with them the theory of the Jewish descent 
of the American race, states this argument as follows: 
"As the Israelites were divided into tribes, and had a 
chief over them, and always marched under ensigns of 
some animal peculiar to each tribe, so the Indian nations 
are universally divided into tribes, under a sachem or 
king, chosen by the people from the wisest and bravest 
among them. He has neither influence nor distinction, 
but from his wisdom and prudence. He is assisted by a 
council of old, wise and beloved men, as they call their 
priests and councilors. Nothing is determined, of a 
public nature, but in this council, where every one has an 
equal voice. The chief, or sachem, sits in the middle, 
and the council on each hand, forming a semi-circle, as 
the high priest of the Jews did in the Sanhedrim of that 
nation." — The Ten Tribes of Israel, p. 117. 

But the simple fact that the American Indians are 
divided into tribes, under chiefs and with councils to 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



make their laws, does not prove their Israelitish extrac- 
tion any more than it proves their descent from the Mon- 
golians, Africans or Polynesians; for tribes of these races 
in Asia, Africa and Polynesia are organized in the same 
general way. Besides, the tribal governments of America 
were not cast in one mould, but in many moulds, and 
none of these were made in Palestine. The Iroquois had 
no supreme chief, but their confederacy, which is de- 
clared to have been "one of the most extraordinary prim- 
itive governments ever recorded," was governed by a 
council of fifty chiefs, who, in time of war, appointed 
two war chiefs to look after their military affairs. 1 
Among the Wyandots each gens, of which there were 
eleven, was governed by a council composed of four 
women, who appointed the gentile chief. The eleven 
gentile councils, with the chiefs, constituted the tribal 
council. 2 The Crow nation is ruled by two head chiefs, 
of equal authority, and six counselors. 3 The Omahas 
formerly were presided over by two head chiefs of equal 
power, assisted by subordinate chiefs. 4 Each town of the 
Creeks had its own chief, or miko, chosen from a par- 
ticular gens and for life; next to him stood the council 
of the town, composed of the mikalgi, and counselors, 
which appointed the Great Warrior ; following these in 
authority came the hint halgi, old men and advisers, who 
presided over the annual busk or feast, had charge of the 
public buildings and directed agricultural pursuits ; after 
these came the isti tchakalgi, beloved men ; and, lastly, 
the common people. 5 The permanent ruler of the Len- 
apes, who was called the peace-chief, was chosen from a 

1 "North Americans of Yesterday," p. 425. 

2 Ibid, p. 420. 

3 Ibid, p. 416. 

4 "Third Rept. Eu. Am. Ethno.," p. 357. 

5 "Migration Legend of the Creeks," Vol. I., pp. 156, 157. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 185 

particular gens by the chiefs of the other gentes ; his 
authority was not absolute and in war he had no concern, 
the military operations being in charge of a war-chief 
who won his place by his prowess and skill. 1 In Mexico 
the king was assisted in the government by a council of 
the nobles. Tlascala was ruled by four supreme lords, 
each independent of the others ; these, with the rest of the 
nobility, formed a parliament or senate which made the 
laws of the State. 2 In Yucatan the power of the king was 
absolute, and he appointed all officers, both secular and 
religious, organized courts, and had the power to con- 
demn to death any of his subjects whom he saw fit. 3 
With the Quiches the king was a despot who appointed 
lieutenants over his provinces and who was supported by 
a council of twenty- four grandees. 4 And in Peru the 
government was a mild, though absolute, despotism, the 
voice of the Inca being considered the voice of the sun. 5 
The reader will observe that, instead of there being 
only one form of tribal government in America, and that 
form resembling the government of the children of Is- 
rael, there were, in fact, many forms which present no 
clearly defined resemblances to the latter. In some tribes 
chieftainship was hereditary; in others, elective; and in 
still others the head of the tribe or band assumed his 
place simply through the pressure of public opinion, with- 
out the formalities of an election. 6 Some of the tribes 
had one chief ; others had a number. Some had councils 
which assisted the chief in the administration of affairs; 
in others the power of the king was absolute, or nearly 

1 "The American Race," p. 76. 

2 "Native Races," Vol. II., p. 141. 

3 Ibid, p. 643. 
*Ibid, p. 641. 

5 "Conquest of Peru," Vol. I., p. 13. 

6 "North Americans of Yesterday," p. 416. 



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so. Some tribes were governed by a council of men; 
others by a council of women. To claim, therefore, that 
there was but one form of tribal government in America, 
and that this form was cast in a Jewish mould, is absurd 
and is contradicted by the facts. 

' WORSHIP OF JEHOVAH. 

Mr. Stebbins says on the similarity of the theistic 
ideas of the Indians and the Jews : "Their worship of 
Jehovah, calling him Yohewah, is itself a good assurance 
of their Hebrew origin." — Lectures, p. 244. And he 
quotes from Catlin the following: "The first and most 
striking fact amongst the North American Indians that 
refers us to the Jews is that of their worshiping, in all 
parts, the Great Spirit, or Jehovah, as the Hebrews were 
ordered to do by divine precept, instead of a plurality 
of gods." 

But there is not one of these assertions true. The 
original words for Deity in the Indian tongues do not 
convey the idea of personality, but express simply the 
supernatural in general, the marvelous, the mysterious, 
the incomprehensible, the unknown. Even the more ad- 
vanced nations, the Aztecs, Mayas and Peruvians, were 
not monotheistic, for they all had many gods, although 
their pantheons were usually presided over by supreme 
rulers like those of the Greeks and Romans. As for the 
"Great Spirit," who in the popular conception was the 
deity of the red man everywhere, it is now conceded by 
all the best students of the primitive American religions 
that he is wholly a creation of the missionary, unknown 
to the American tribes before the Discovery; and the 
name "Yohewah" is only the effort of the Cherokees to 
pronounce the English Jehovah ; as are also the Choctaw 
"Chihowa" and the Creek "Chihufa." The original word 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



187 



for God in the Cherokee is Oo-neh-lah-ner-he ; in the 
Choctaw it is Chit-o-ka-ka, and in the Creek, Hi-sak-i-ta 
Im-mis-si. 

Powell, on American society, art and religion, writes : 
"Nations with civilized institutions, art with palaces, mon- 
otheism as the worship of the Great Spirit, all vanish 
from the priscan condition of North America in the light 
of anthropologic research. Tribes with the social in- 
stitutions of kinship, art with its highest architectural 
development exhibited in the structure of communal 
dwellings, and polytheism in the worship of mythic ani- 
mals and nature-gods remain." — First Ann. Rept. Bu. 
Ethno., p. 69. 

NOTIONS OF A THEOCRACY. 

Jenkins asserts: "The Indians also, agreeable to the 
theocracy of Israel, think the Great Spirit to be the im- 
mediate head of their state, and that God chose them out 
of all the rest of mankind as his peculiar and beloved 
people." — The Ten Tribes of Israel, p. 141. 

But as the American Indians originally did not have 
a knowledge of the Jewish Jehovah, how could they have 
had the Jewish conception of a theocracy? It is impos- 
sible to understand how they could have believed in the 
divine government as did the children of Israel when 
their gods were only mere fetiches, deified animals, 
apotheosized men and the elements and phenomena of 
nature. If such a belief as Jenkins describes existed, it 
certainly dates from this side of the time when they were 
taught by the Christian missionaries to believe in a Great 
Spirit. 

BELIEF IN THE ADMINISTRATION OF ANGELS. 

"These people," says Jenkins, "believe most firmly 
that their seer or high priest has communion with power- 



i88 



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ful invisible spirits, whom they suppose have some share 
in the rule and government of human affairs, as well as 
in that of the elements." — The Ten Tribes, p. 147. 

But while this is true, it does not suggest any resem- 
blance whatever to the communion of the Hebrew proph- 
ets of old with the angels of the Lord, but was a practice 
most heathenish and barbarous. The red man is very 
superstitious. He believes in dreams and visions and 
brings them on by excessive feasting or protracted fast- 
ing. His "angels" were the manitous, okies, fairies, 
spooks and hobgoblins seen in these dreams and visions. 
But his communication with the unseen world was not all 
imaginary, and many of his medicine men were expert 
mediums and could "call up the spirits" in a way that 
would put some of the experts of the present day to 
shame. Brinton, in the following, gives the general 
method pursued by the Indian priests in communicating, 
supposedly, with the spirits of the dead: "One of the 
most peculiar and characteristic exhibitions of their 
power was to summon a spirit to answer inquiries con- 
cerning the future and the absent. A great similarity 
marked this proceeding in all northern tribes, from the 
Eskimos to the Mexicans. A circular or conical lodge of 
stout poles, four or eight in number, planted firmly in the 
ground, was covered with skins or mats, a small aperture 
only being left for the seer to enter. Once in, he care- 
fully closed the hole and commenced his incantations. 
Soon the lodge trembles, the strong poles shake and bend 
as with the united strength of a dozen men, and strange, 
unearthly sounds, now far aloft in the air, now deep in 
the ground, anon approaching near and nearer, reach the 
ears of the spectators. At length the priest announces 
that the spirit is present, and is prepared to answer ques- 
tions. An indispensable preliminary to any inquiry is to 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



insert a handful of tobacco, or a string of beads, or some 
other douceur, under the skins, ostensibly for the behoof 
of the celestial visitor, who would seem not to be above 
earthly wants and vanities. The replies received, though 
occasionally singularly clear and correct, are usually of 
that profoundly ambiguous purport which leaves the 
anxious inquirer little wiser than he was before." — 
Myths of the New World, p. 309. 

From this it will be seen that the angels with whom 
the Indian medicine men communed were of the same 
class with those who possessed the demoniac of Gadara. 
The practice of holding intercourse with such spirits 
would be branded by every true Latter-day Saint of 
to-day as a practice exceedingly sinful. 

THEIR LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS. 

It is claimed that the languages and dialects of the 
American Indians possess affinities to the Hebrew. This 
is a favorite argument with the defenders of the Book 
of Mormon. Apostle Kelley quotes the following from 
Josiah Priest: "Hebrew words are found among the 
American Indians in considerable variety." — Presidency 
and Priesthood, p. 259. And Apostle Pratt gives the 
following from Elias Boudinot: "Their language in its 
roots, idiom and particular construction appears to have 
the whole genius of the Hebrew ; and what is very re- 
markable, and well worthy of serious attention, has most 
of the peculiarities of the language, especially those in 
which it differs from most other languages." — A Voice 
of Warning, p. 82. 

But these assertions are so manifestly false that they 
hardly need serious consideration. In the first place, the 
Indians did not speak a language, but languages. Brinton 
informs us that there are 180 stocks in the two Americas, 



190 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



each having its own distinct tongue, which is divided and 
subdivided into numerous languages and dialects. Ban- 
croft counted nearly six hundred languages between, 
Alaska and the Isthmus of Panama, and these are so 
..diverse one from another that the tongue of the Iroquois 
is unintelligible to the Dakota and both to the Algonkin. 
Besides this diversity, the Indian languages are polysyn- 
thetic in structure, while the Hebrew is inflectional, and, 
since the days of Duponceau, they have been recognized 
as constituting a linguistic body by themselves. 

THEIR MANNER OF COUNTING TIME. 

On the Indian manner of reckoning time, and its re- 
semblance to the Jewish, Jenkins says : "They reckon 
time after the manner of the Hebrews. They divide the 
year into spring, summer, autumn (or the falling of the 
leaf), and winter. Korah is their word for winter with 
the Cherokee Indians, as it is with the Hebrews. They 
number the years by any of these four periods, for they 
have no name for year. And they subdivide these, and 
count the year by lunar months, or moons, like the Israel- 
ites, who also counted by moons." — The Ten Tribes, pp. 
119, 120. 

The Jewish divisions of time were a year of twelve 
lunar months, with an intercalary month, Yeadar, a week 
of seven days, and a day beginning at evening and 
divided into two parts, daylight and darkness, the for- 
mer divided into twelve hours and the latter into three 
watches. 1 Nowhere in America did such a method of 
reckoning time prevail. The mere fact that the Indians 
reckoned time by years, seasons, lunations and days sig- 
nifies nothing as to their origin, for all primitive peoples 
do the same. It is only natural that man, observing the 



1 Bissell's "Biblical Antiquities," pp. 134-139. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



191 



succession of daylight and darkness, the changes of the 
moon and the revolution of the seasons, should reckon by 
these natural divisions of time. Rev. J. G. Wood says 
of the Hottentot : "As is the case with most savage races, 
his unit of time is the new moon, and he makes all his 
reckonings to consist of so many moons." — Uncivilized 
Races of Men, Vol. I., p. 239. Is this proof that the 
Hottentots are descendants of the lost tribes? 

In Mexico and Central America, where the people 
had developed somewhat beyond the northern tribes, the 
method of reckoning time was both artificial and original. 
With both the Aztecs and Mayas the year consisted of 
eighteen months of twenty days each, divided into weeks 
of five days each, the last day of each week being set 
apart for marketing and pleasure. And five additional 
days were intercalated each year to make the 365 / 
Among the Muyscas the day was divided into four parts ; 
three days made a week and ten weeks a lunation, or 
suna. Twelve sunas made a rural year, twenty a civil 
year and thirty-seven a ritual year. 2 These methods of 
reckoning time are strikingly un-Jewish. 

THEIR PROPHETS AND HIGH PRIESTS. 

The Indian priests or prophets were known by differ- 
ent names among different tribes. The Algonkins and 
Dakotas called them "those knowing divine things ;" the 
Mexicans, "masters or guardians of the divine things;" 
the Cherokees, those "possessed of the divine fire;" the 
Iroquois, "keepers of the faith ;" the Quichuas, "the 
learned ;" the Mayas, "the listeners ;" the Eskimo, "the 
ancient ones ;" and the Apaches, the "wise ones." To the 
average white man they are known simply as "medicine 



1 "Native Races," Vol. II., Chapters XVI., XVII. 
8 "American Antiquities," p. 317. 



192 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



men." Among the Algonkins there were three orders in 
the priesthood, the wabeno, the mide and the jossakeed, 
the last being the highest, which no white man could 
enter. The priesthood exerted a powerful influence over 
all the tribes and was the great foe that the Christian 
missionaries had to face in planting in the wilds of 
America the gospel of the cross. The advocates of the 
Jewish theory contend that the priesthoods of the Ameri- 
can tribes are only another mark of their descent from 
the children of Israel. On the prophets and priests 
among the Indian tribes Jenkins remarks : "The Indians 
have among them orders of men answering to our proph- 
ets and priests. In the Muskohge language hitch lalage 
signifies cunning men, or persons prescient of futurity, 
much the same as the Hebrew seer. But the Indians, in 
general, call their pretended prophets loa-che, men resem- 
bling the holy fire, or elohim." — The Ten Tribes, p. 145. 

Here is a surprise for our students of Hebrew! On 
their high priests he quotes with approval the following 
from Bartram : "There is in every town or tribe a high 
priest, usually nicknamed by the white people the juggler 
or conjurer, besides several of inferior rank." — Ibid, p. 
147. 

He also informs us that the Indians wore on their 
breast a plate made from a conch-shell, and that it was 
hung over the neck by an otter-skin strap the ends of 
which were passed through two holes bored in the shell 
and fastened to polished buck-horn buttons. This, he 
says, was in "imitation of the precious stones of urim 
and thummim, which miraculously blazed upon the 
high priest's breast the unerring words of the divine 
oracle." 

None but the eye of a half -crazed theorist can see in 
these similarities any evidence to support the theory of 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



193 



the Israelitish descent of the American Indians. If the 
Jews and Indians were the only peoples who have had 
prophets and high priests, there might be some force to 
the analogy, but as they are to be found among many 
other tribes, it counts for nothing and proves nothing. 

FEAST OF FIRSTFRUITS. 

The Jewish "feast of weeks," which is also called 
"Pentecost," "feast of harvest" or "day of firstfruits," is 
said to have had its analogue in America in the puskita, 
or busk, of the Creeks and similar festivals among other 
tribes. 

The law governing an observance of the feast of 
weeks among the Israelites is given in Num. 28:26-31. 
"Also in the day of the firstfruits, when ye bring a new 
meat-offering unto the Lord, after your weeks be out, ye 
shall have an holy convocation ; ye shall do no servile 
work; but ye shall offer the burnt-offering for a sweet 
savor unto the Lord : two young bullocks, one ram, seven 
lambs of the first year; and their meat-offering of flour 
mingled with oil, three tenth deals unto one bullock, two 
tenth deals unto one ram, a several tenth deal unto one 
lamb, throughout the seven lambs; and one kid of the 
goats, to make an atonement for you. Ye shall offer 
them beside the continual burnt-offering, and his meat- 
offering (they shall be unto you without blemish), and 
their drink-offerings." This feast lasted one day. 

On the observance-of such a feast among the Indians 
of the southern part of the United States, Jenkins says: 
"Mr. Bartram, who visited the Southern Indians in 1778, 
gives an account of the same feast, but in another nation. 
He says that the feast of firstfruits is their principal 
festival. This seems to end the old and begin the new 
ecclesiastical year. It commences when their new crops 



194 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



are arrived at maturity. This is their most solemn cele- 
bration." — The Ten Tribes, p. 165. 

I condense the following account of the observance 
of the busk among the Creeks from the description given 
of it in Gatschet's "Migration Legend of the Creeks," 
Vol. L, pp. 177-183. Let the reader be on the lookout for 
any Jewish features it may present, but let him not be 
disappointed if he does not find any. 

The busk, or push it a, lasted from four to eight days, 
the length of its observance depending upon the size and 
importance of the town celebrating it. The time of its 
observance, which was fixed by the miko and his council, 
depended upon the maturity of the maize crop and upon 
other conditions. On the first day the men cleaned the 
inclosed area of their great house (four shed-like build- 
ings put together so as to form an inclosed square) and 
sprinkled it with white sand. Those whose duty it was 
prepared the powerful emetic, black drink, while others 
placed four logs in the center of the area in the form of a 
cross, with the arms pointing toward the four cardinal 
points. At the point where the four logs converged, the 
new fire was made by friction. Three dances were 
danced during the day: in the morning the women of the 
turkey gens danced the turkey dance, in the afternoon 
four men and four women danced the tadpole dance, and 
in the evening the men. danced the hiniha. In the middle 
of the forenoon of the second day the women took part 
in the gun dance. At noon the men rubbed ashes from 
the hearth of the new fire upon their chins, necks and 
bellies, and, after a plunge in the river, returned to the 
great house. They then rubbed some of the new maize, 
which in the meantime had been prepared by the women, 
upon their faces, breasts and hands, and the feasting be- 
gan. The third day was passed by the men sitting in the 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



195 



inclosed square. On the fourth day the women cleaned 
their hearths, and, after sprinkling them with clean, white 
sand, obtained a spark of the new fire and kindled their 
own with it. After this, the four logs being consumed, 
the men rubbed the ashes, as before, upon their persons 
and leaped into the river. Following this act they tasted 
salt and danced the long dance. On the fifth day four 
new logs were placed on the hearth of the great house 
and the men drank assi (black drink). The sixth and 
seventh days were spent by the men in the great house. 
The ceremonies of the eighth day were the most impres- 
sive. A decoction made of fourteen medicinal plants was 
drunken by the men and rubbed on their joints. Follow- 
ing this, another mixture was prepared composed of the 
ashes of old maize cobs, pine burs and ashes from the 
home hearths. A pan of this was mixed with another of 
wet clay and was brought to the cabin of the miko, and 
two others were taken to the cabins of the warriors, who 
rubbed themselves with the contents. After this, the 
miko and his counselors walked four times round the 
burning logs, each time throwing tobacco blossoms into 
the sacred fire, which ceremony was repeated by the war- 
riors. A cane with two white feathers on one end of it 
was then stuck up at the miko's cabin, and remained until 
sunset, when a man of the fish gens took it down, and, 
followed by the populace, marched to the river. On the 
way the death-whoop was sounded four times, at inter- 
vals, until they reached the water's edge. Then some of 
the tobacco was thrown into the river, and the men, 
plunging in, picked up four stones, and, crossing them- 
selves, uttered the death-whoop four times, each time 
throwing one of the stones back into the river. After 
nightfall the mad dance was participated in and the busk 
ended. At this feast a general amnesty was proclaimed 



196 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



and all crimes, except murder, were forgiven. This is 
Adair's "day of atonement." At the celebration of the 
busk old furniture was broken to pieces and was replaced 
by new, and old feuds were forgiven and forgotten. 
Similar to the busk of the Creeks was the green-corn 
dance of the Cherokees and other tribes, but outside of 
their being feasts of firstfruits, marking the incoming 
harvest, they possessed no features similar to those of 
the feast of firstfruits among the children of Israel. 

circumcision. 

It is claimed that circumcision was practiced by the 
American Indians. Beatty, an early traveler on the Ohio, 
asserts that an old Christian Indian informed him that 
an old uncle told him that long before his day the people 
practiced the rite, but that it was given up on account 
of the mockery of the young people. But this story has 
come through too many hands to be very reliable. It is 
possible that it was wholly the invention of the old Chris- 
tian Indian to make the native religion appear to conform 
more closely to the Jewish. 

Nevertheless, it is certain that a rite analogous to cir- 
cumcision was practiced by a few American tribes, though 
it was by no means universal. Bancroft remarks : "Al- 
though circumcision was certainly not by any means gen- 
eral, yet sufficient proof exists to show that it was in use 
in some form among certain tribes." — Native Races, Vol. 
II., p. 278. 

That the natives of Mexico and Central America 
practiced the rite is stoutly maintained by some, while it 
is just as stoutly denied by others. Las Casas and Men- 
dieta declare that it was practiced by the Aztecs and 
Totonacs, and De Bourbourg claims the same for the 
Mijes, while Cogolludo denies that it was practiced in 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



197 



Yucatan, and Herrera and Acosta consider the incision 
made on the prepuce to have been mistaken for the rite. 
Clavigero denies that the rite was ever practiced, and 
declares that the scarification of the breast, stomach and 
arms is the practice confounded by other authors with 
circumcision. 1 

But even if the rite were performed in America, it 
could not have been Jewish circumcision, for circumcision 
among the Jews was for a "token of the covenant" be-x 
tween them and Jehovah, and the Indians had absolutely 
no knowledge of the Jewish Deity. Therefore, it was 
either a phallic rite, as Squier thinks, 2 or simply the sign 
of the renunciation of all sexual pleasure for a life of 
celibacy, as Brinton believes. 3 But circumcision is by no 
means an exclusively Jewish practice, for it is observed 
by the Kaffirs, South Sea Islanders, Ethiopians, Egyp- 
tians and Mohammedans. Says Bancroft: "At the pres- 
ent day the rite of circumcision may be traced almost in 
an unbroken line from China to the Cape of Good Hope." 
— Native Races, Vol. III., p. 439. Therefore, if it was 
derived from the Old World at all, it might have been 
brought from many other countries besides Palestine. 

ABLUTIONS AND ANOINTINGS. 

Both the American Indians and the Jews applied 
water to their persons ceremonially, and this is triumph- 
antly held up as another proof of their relationship. The 
following is from Jenkins : "The Indian nations in the 
coldest weather, and when the ground is covered with 
snow, practice their religious ablutions. Men and chil- 
dren turn out of their warm houses, singing their usual 



1 "Native Races," Vol. II., pp. 278, 280. 
2 ''Native Races," Vol. III., p. 507. 
» "Myths of the New World," p. 172, 



198 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



sacred notes, at the dawn of day, 'Y. O. He-wah,' and 
thus they skip along, singing till they reach the river, 
when they instantly plunge into it." — The Ten Tribes, 

p; 174. 

But what is there in this to suggest an Israelitish 
origin? Smith ("Bible Dictionary," Art. Baptism) says: 
"It is well known that ablution and bathing was common 
in most ancient nations as a preparation for prayers and 
sacrifice, or as expiatory of sin." I presume that there 
is not a savage tribe but who applies water to the person 
in some of its ceremonies. Moral defilement is so inti- 
mately connected with physical defilement in the uncul- 
tured mind that the means that removes one will remove 
the other. 

On the anointings among the Indians, Jenkins says: 
"The Hebrews also had various washings and anointings. 
They generally, after bathing, anointed themselves with 
oil. Their kings, prophets and priests were anointed with 
oil, and the Saviour himself is described as 'the Anointed/ 
The Indian priests and prophets, or beloved men, are 
always anointed by unction. The Chickasaws, some time 
ago, set apart some of their old men. They first obliged 
them to sweat themselves for the space of three days and 
nights in a small hut made for that purpose, at a distance 
from the town, for fear of pollution, and from a strong 
desire they all have of secreting their religious mysteries. 
They eat nothing but green tobacco leaves and drink 
nothing but button-snake wood tea to cleanse their bodies 
and prepare them to serve in the beloved, holy office. 
After which their priestly garments are put on, with the 
ornaments before described, and then bear's oil is poured 
on their heads. Like the Jews, both men and women 
often anoint themselves with bear's oil." — The Ten 
Tribes, p. 174, 



CUMORAll REVISITED 



In the absence of proof that the Hebrew prophets and 
priests sweated themselves-, ate green tobacco leaves, 
drank button-snake wood tea and anointed their heads 
with bear's oil, preparatory to taking up their sacred 
duties, we are justified in concluding that this analogy 
proves nothing but the ignorance and credulity of its 
propounders. 

LAWS OF UNCLEANNESS. 

The Jewish and Indian women, during their menstrual 
periods, were separated from society, and the former 
were never more scrupulous about this than were our 
own aboriginal tribes. Usually among the Indians lodges, 
apart from the rest, were set aside as places for their 
retirement. Schoolcraft considers this the most strikingly 
Jewish of any of the Indian customs. "The most striking 
custom of apparently Hebraic origin," he says, "is the 
periodical separation of females, and the strong and uni- 
versal idea of uncleanness connected therewith." — School- 
craft's Archaeology, Vol. III., pp. 60, 61. 

Of all the analogies cited, this is the only one so far 
considered which is sufficiently exclusive to deserve any 
special attention, for while the idea of uncleanness was 
associated with woman at the time of her menstrual 
periods by many primitive peoples, yet among none was 
it associated with her to the degree that it was among the 
Jews and the American Indians. 

CITIES OF REFUGE. 

Israel had six cities of refuge, three on each side of 
the Jordan. To any of these a person suspected of mur- 
der might flee and find a safe asylum until his case had 
been decided by judicial inquiry. If, upon trial, he were 
found guilty, he was turned over to the avenger of blood 



200 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



for execution; if guiltless, he was released; or, if guilt- 
less of the crime of murder, but chargeable with some 
other form of homicide, he was detained until the death 
of the high priest. 

A similar institution existed in America in the "peace 
towns" of the Cherokees, Creeks and Senecas. The peace 
town of the Cherokees was Echota, near the mouth of the 
Little Tennessee. That of the Creeks was Kusa, or Coosa, 
on the Coosa River, Alabama. And that of the Senecas 
was Gaustrayea, four miles east of Lewiston, New 
York. Among the Cherokees — and here their law dif- 
fered from that of the Israelites — even the willful mur- 
derer was safe as long as he remained within the precincts 
of their sacred Echota, until the annual recurrence of the 
green-corn dance, when a general amnesty was pro- 
claimed. If he desired to leave before, he either had to 
run the risk of being slain, or else appease the wrath of 
the friends of the murdered man with presents. Among 
the Iroquois, fugitives from justice, no matter what their 
tribe, found safety, lodging and food at Gaustrayea. Cur- 
tains of deerskin separated the pursued from the pursuer 
until the former had been properly cared for, when they 
were withdrawn and the hostile parties could either renew 
hostilities or flight as they saw fit. 1 Similar to these were 
the places of refuge of the Greeks and Romans, such as 
groves, altars and temples. So great was their abuse that 
Tiberius limited their number and greatly curtailed 
their privileges. This, with the preceding, is the closest 
analogy that I have observed between the American In- 
dians and the children of Israel, yet when there is so 
much against it the relationship of the two peoples can 
not be proved by any such chance similarities. 



1 "Nineteenth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," pp. 207, 208. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



201 



ABSTINENCE FROM UNCLEAN THINGS. 

Apostle Orson Pratt gives as one of his reasons for 
believing that the Indians are of Jewish extraction "their 
abstaining from eating certain things forbidden by the 
law of Moses." And Jenkins says : "The Indians would 
not eat either the Mexican hog, or the sea-cow, or the 
turtle, as Gumilla and Edwards inform us ; but they 
held them in the greatest abhorrence. Neither would they 
eat the eel, or any animal or bird they deemed impure." — 
The Ten Tribes, p. 175. 

But the disgust in which these various animals were 
held must have been purely local, for they were, in many 
parts, considered very wholesome as food. The Mosaic 
law classes as unclean the camel, hare, coney, hog, those 
fishes without scales, the weasel, mouse, lizard and chame- 
leon. In America the llama, the American camel, was 
highly prized as food by the Peruvian tribes. The tapir, 
the Mexican hog, was a favorite article of food with the 
Mayas, as was also the turtle ; and both, with the sea-cow, 
were highly esteemed by the Isthmian tribes. And as for 
squirrels, eels, catfish, hares, and, in a pinch, even mice 
and snakes, they did not come amiss in the aboriginal 
larder. Cannibalism prevailed throughout America, and 
there were but few tribes who were not addicted to the 
practice of eating human flesh. 1 The semi-civilized 
Aztecs and Mayas both were cannibals and ate the flesh 
of their human sacrifices. The practice prevailed in the 
north among the Algonkins and Iroquois, as noted by 
the Jesuits, and history records the fate of a Miami chief 
who, being a friend to the English, was murdered by th~ 
Indian allies of the French and devoured. Lafitau, 
Muret and Bruhier declare that some of the South Amer- 



1 "Prehistoric America," p. 62. 



202 



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ican tribes even ate their dead, but this is denied by other, 
and perhaps better, authority. 1 It would seem that the 
American Indians were very far from the Jews in respect 
to the animal food they ate. 

MARRIAGE, DIVORCE AND PUNISHMENT OF ADULTERY. 

Says Catlin : "In their marriages the Indians, as did 
the ancient Jews, uniformly buy their wives by giving 
presents, and in many tribes very closely resemble them 
in other forms and ceremonies of their marriages." 

But the custom of wife-buying is not exclusively a 
Jewish custom. In Africa the Zulu still purchases his 
wife with oxen, the number given depending upon the 
value set upon her by her parents. And the practice of 
wife-buying existed among our barbaric English ances- 
tors up to the time of Cnut, who abolished it. It is only 
one of those practices of primitive society arising from 
the belief that women are the property of the men. This 
is a sufficient explanation of the American custom; we 
need not look for a better. 

As to divorce, if an American Indian and his wife 
could not agree, the usual custom was for them simply 
to separate, he going to his gens and she to hers, the 
children, if they had any, usually following the mother. 
I fail to see any distinctive Jewish custom here. 

As for the crime of adultery, a very few tribes pun- 
ished the guilty parties by stoning them to death. The 
American Indian, like most other men, was jealous of his 
marital rights, and as stones were plentiful and he knew 
how to hurl them it is not to be wondered at that he some- 
times resorted to this method of punishing his wife's 
seducer. Why we have to go to Palestine for an explana- 
tion of this simple and primitive method of punishment is 



1 "First Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 182. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



203 



inexplicable. But all tribes did not stone the adulterer to 
death. Among the Modocs the adulterer was punished 
by putting out an eye, by expulsion from the tribe, or by 
paying a fine of a string of beads. 1 A Gallinomeros slew 
his wife's seducer. 2 In another California tribe the hus- 
band could either kill his wife or give her up to her mate 
and appropriate the latter's wife to himself. 3 Adultery 
among the Comanches was punishable by death or ex- 
posure or was settled by private agreement by the inter- 
position of the elderly warriors. 4 The Zapotec could kill 
or pardon his wife's seducer according to pleasure ; a man 
who forcibly deflowered a virgin was stoned to death. 0 
Adulterers in Mexico were either stoned or strangled. 8 
In Yucatan and Guatemala they were thrown from preci- 
pices. 7 Again, in Guatemala, a married man taken in the 
act with a maiden was compelled to pay a fine of from 
sixty to one hundred rare feathers. If the crime was 
committed with a married woman, for the first offense 
the parties were simply warned and were compelled to 
pay a fine of feathers ; for the second, they were forced 
to inhale the smoke of a certain herb, tobacoyay, which, 
while painful, was not fatal. 8 There is nothing in these 
methods of punishment to suggest a Jewish derivation. 

ORNAMENTS. 

The children of Israel and the American Indians wore 
ornaments, and of course, as no other people have done 
the same, they must be related. William Penn writes as 

1 "Native Races," Vol. I., p. 350. 

2 Ibid, p. 390. 

3 Ibid, p. 412. 

4 Ibid, p. 510. 

5 Ibid, p. 660. 

6 Ibid, p. 464. 

7 Ibid, p. 658. 

8 Ibid, p. 673. 



204 



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follows on Indian ornamentation : "They wore ear-rings 
and nose-jewels; bracelets on their arms and legs; rings 
on their fingers ; necklaces made of highly polished shells 
found in their rivers and on their coasts. Their females 
tied up their hair behind, worked bands around their 
heads and ornamented them with shells and feathers, and 
are fond of strings of beads round several parts of their 
bodies. They use shells and turkey spurs around the 
tops of their moccasins, to tinkle like little bells as they 
walk." 

And Jenkins sees in these Indians, with their orna- 
ments and finery, a wonderful resemblance to the people 
described by the prophet Isaiah (ch. 3: 18). "In that 
day the Lord will take away the bravery of their tinkling 
ornaments about their feet, and their cauls, and their 
round tires like the moon, the chains, and the bracelets, 
and the mufflers, the bonnets, and the ornaments of the 
legs, and the headbands, and the tablets, and the ear- 
rings, the rings, and the nose-jewels, etc., etc." 

Of course this is very conclusive ! It need not sur- 
prise us if before long our Mormon friends should sug- 
gest the descent of the Fiji Islanders and our "upper ten" 
from the lost tribes for the same reason. This argument 
is devoid of both logic and common sense. 

PURIFICATION AND PREPARATORY CEREMONIES. 

Adair gives this account of the purification and pre- 
paratory ceremonies of the American Indians, evidently 
of the Creeks : "Before the Indians go to war, they have 
many preparatory ceremonies of purification and fasting, 
like what is recorded of the Israelites. When the leader 
begins to beat up for volunteers, he goes three times 
round his dark winter house, contrary to the course of the 
sun, sounding the war-whoop, singing the war-song and 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



205 



beating a drum. He addresses the crowd who come about 
him, and after much ceremony he proceeds to whoop 
again for the warriors to come and join him and sanctify 
themselves for success against the common enemy, ac- 
cording to their ancient religious law. A number soon 
join him in his winter house, where they live separate 
from all others, and purify themselves for the space of 
three days and three nights, exclusive of the first broken 
day. On each day they observe a strict fast till sunset, 
watching the young men very narrowly (who have not 
been initiated in war titles), lest unusual hunger should 
tempt them to violate it, to the supposed danger of all 
their lives in the war, by destroying the power of their 
purifying, beloved physic, which they drink plentifully 
during that time," — The Ten Tribes, pp. 127, 128. 

Gatschet describes the winter house of the Creeks as 
a building circular in shape and about twenty-five or 
thirty feet in diameter. Around the wall was a broad, 
circular seat, and in the middle, on an elevated bit of 
ground, was built the fire. From its high temperature 
it was called the "hot house," and here the braves came 
to take their religious sweats. The preparation for war 
consisted in drinking war-physic, made from snakeroot, 
and singing war and charm songs, under the leadership 
of conjurers, who, they claimed, thus gave them power 
over their enemies. 

The children of Israel, before going to battle, were 
wont to consult Jehovah through their prophets and the 
Urim and Thummim, offer sacrifices and prepare them- 
selves by fasting and prayer; but we are not informed 
that they assembled their armies with the war-whoop, 
drank war-physic, went through a religious sweat or 
learned charm-songs. So much for this analogy 



206 



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ARK OF THE COVENANT. 

Elder Stebbins has taken the following description of 
the Indian "ark of the covenant" from Haines' "Ameri- 
can Indian" : "It is also insisted by many, as further evi- 
dence showing the Jewish origin of the American Indian, 
that they have had their imitation of the ark of the cove- 
nant in ancient Israel. Rev. Ethan Smith says that dif- 
ferent travelers, and from different regions, unite in this, 
and he refers to the fact that Mr. Adair is full in his ac- 
count of it. He describes it as a small square box, made 
convenient to carry on the back ; that the Indians never 
set it on the ground, but on rocks (logs?) in low ground, 
where stones were not to be had, and on stones where 
they are to be found." — Lectures, p. 248. 

Adair, in his description of this ark, 1 tells us that it 
was covered with "drest deer skin and placed on a couple 
of short blocks." He states that a certain gentleman of 
his acquaintance saw a very importunate stranger who 
was very anxious to view the contents, when the Indian 
"centinel" drew his bow and would have shot him 
through had he not suddenly withdrawn. When this 
gentleman asked the interpreter what this box contained, 
he told him that there was nothing in it but a "bundle 
of conjuring traps." This ark, then, turns out to be only 
a so-called "medicine-box." It also seems that the cane 
boxes in which some tribes carried the bones of their 
dead were mistaken for arks. Brinton says : "Instead of 
interring the bones, were they those of some distinguished 
chieftain, they were deposited in the temples or the coun- 
cil-houses, usually in small chests of cane or splints. Such 
were the charnel-houses which the historians of De Soto's 
expedition so often mentioned, and these are the 'arks' 



1 "Nineteenth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 503. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



207 



which Adair and other authors, who have sought to trace 
the descent of the Indians from the Jews, have likened to 
that which the ancient Israelites bore with them on their 
migrations." — Myths of the Nezv World, p. 296. Com- 
ment is unnecessary. 

SANCTUM SANCTORUM. 

"As the Jews had a sanctum sanctorum, or the most 
holy place, in their tabernacle and temple, so have all the 
Indian nations, particularly the Muskogee nation. It is 
partitioned off by a mud wall, about breast high, between 
the white seat which always stands on the left of the red 
painted war-seat. There they deposit their consecrated 
vessels and supposed holy utensils, none of the laity dar- 
ing to approach the sacred place for fear of particular 
damage to themselves, and a general hurt to the people, 
from the supposed divinity of the place." — The Ten 
Tribes, p. 149. 

Gatschet ("A Migration Legend of the Creeks," Vol. 
I., pp. 1 71- 174) gives a very good description of this 
"sanctum sanctorum" of the Creeks, made up from the 
accounts of Swan, Milfort and Hawkins, and from him 
I draw the following facts, leaving the reader to decide 
whether or not the sacred place of this tribe bears any 
resemblance whatever to the Holy of Holies of the Jews. 
Their great house, tchuku lako, was formed by four shed- 
like buildings opening inward and placed so as to form 
an inclosed square. Each building faced one of the car- 
dinal points of the compass and was divided into three 
apartments, or cabins, by low clay partitions. In each 
apartment there were three seats, or platforms, rising 
one above another, the first being two feet above the 
ground, the second eight feet above the first, and the 
third eight feet above the second. Over these were 



208 



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thrown mats of cane and each would seat from forty to 
sixty persons. Hawkins says that the northern building 
was for the warriors ; the eastern, for the young people ; 
the southern, for the beloved men ; and the western, for 
the chiefs and people of high rank. The last was also 
their sanctum sanctorum, and here, according to both 
Swan and Jenkins, they made their war-physic, black- 
drink and kept their chaplets, eagle-tails, pipe of peace 
and stored lumber. In the center of the inclosed area, 
which was known as consecrated ground, a perpetual fire 
was kept burning, fed by four logs and attended by men 
specially appointed for that purpose. 

The Jewish tabernacle was a rectangular structure 
45 feet long, 15 feet wide and 15 feet high, sided with 
boards of acacia wood. One-third of the inclosed space on 
the west end was called the Holy of Holies, the other two- 
thirds the Holy Place. A veil separated the two apart- 
ments. Within the inner sanctuary was the ark of the 
covenant containing the tables of the covenant, and here, 
on the tenth day of the seventh month, the high priest 
appeared with the blood of the sacrifice which he "offered 
for himself and for the sins of the people." It requires 
an eye long trained by a determination to prove the Jew- 
ish theory to observe in the great house of the Muskogee 
Indians any similarity whatever to the tabernacle of the 
children of Israel. 

BURIAL OF THE DEAD. 

On the manner of burial among the American In- 
dians, and its resemblance to the Jewish, Jenkins says : 
"If any one dies at a distance and they are not pursued 
by an enemy, they place the corpse on a scaffold, secured 
from wild beasts and fowls of prey. When they imagine 
the flesh is consumed, and the bones dried, they return 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



209 



to the place, bring them home and inter them in a very 
solemn manner. The Hebrews, in like manner, carefully 
buried their dead, but, on any accident, they gathered 
their bones, and laid them in the tombs of their fore- 
fathers." — The Ten Tribes, p. 133. 

He then cites the burial of the bones of Joseph which 
were brought by the Israelites from the land of Egypt. 

But there are but very few particular resemblances 
to the Jewish in the burial customs of the American 
Indians. It was a practice with a number of tribes to 
inter their dead temporarily, until after the flesh had 
decayed away, when the bones were gathered, carefully 
scraped and placed in the "bone house" until it was full, 
when they were all buried in a common sepulchre. The 
Jesuits observed this custom among the tribes of Canada, 
and it was practiced by the Choctaws and other southern 
tribes. This is the practice that is cited as a Jewish 
analogy. 

Dr. H. C. Yarrow, in his excellent paper, "Study of 
the Mortuary Customs of the North American Indians," 
in the "First Report of the Bureau of American Ethnol- 
ogy," gives seven general methods pursued by the Amer- 
ican Indians in disposing of their dead, none of them 
similar exclusively to the Jewish. 

"1. By inhumation in pits, graves or holes in the 
ground, stone graves or cists, in mounds, beneath or in 
cabins, wigwams, houses or lodges, or in caves. 

"2. By embalmment or a process of mummifying, the 
remains being afterwards placed in the earth, caves, 
mounds, boxes on scaffolds or in charnel-houses. 

"3. By deposition of remains in urns. 

"4. By surface burial, the remains being placed in 
hollow trees or logs, pens, or simply covered with earth, 
or bark, or rocks, forming cairns. 



210 



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"5. By cremation, or partial burning, generally on the 
surface of the earth, occasionally beneath, the resulting 
bones or ashes being placed in pits in the ground, in 
boxes placed on scaffolds or trees, in urns, sometimes 
scattered. 

"6. By aerial sepulture, the bodies being left in lodges, 
houses, cabins, tents, deposited on scaffolds or trees, in 
boxes or canoes, the two latter receptacles supported on 
scaffolds or posts, or placed on the ground. Occasionally 
baskets have been used to contain the remains of chil- 
dren, these being hung to trees. 

"7. By aquatic burial, beneath the water, or in canoes, 
which were turned adrift." 

Among the Jews the burial usually took place the 
same day that the person died. The common manner of 
burial was in vaults, natural or artificial excavations in 
the earth or rock. Such methods of disposing of the 
dead as by cremation, or by depositing them on scaffolds, 
in hollow logs or by setting them adrift in canoes, were 
not practiced by the people of Palestine. The usual pos- 
ture in which the Indian buried his dead was the squat- 
ting; in Palestine the body was usually laid upon its 
back. 

Reader, these are the analogies cited by Mormon 
writers to prove that the American Indians are descend- 
ants of the children of Israel. Mr. Stebbins, after giving 
them all, either in his own or in the language of another, 
says : "Many more evidences might be presented, but it 
seems needless ; for enough proof has been given to sat- 
isfy all just demands for evidence that the native Ameri- 
cans were descendants from the Hebrew tribes." — Lec- 
tures, p. 256. Some people are easily satisfied. 

Out of the entire number of analogies cited, there are 
but two that are sufficiently close to cause any comment. 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



211 



These are the custom of the separation of women and the 
institution of the "peace town," which bear a somewhat 
close similarity to a practice and an institution among the 
Jews. The rest, when carefully followed out, which the 
Mormons dare not do in their works, turn out to be so 
slight that most of them need a good deal of touching up 
to make the supposed Hebrew features apparent. But 
what do the two analogies mentioned prove? Nothing; 
for more than to counterbalance them we have the native 
peculiarities in physique, religion, custom, habit and be- 
lief which can not be harmonized with this theory of 
descent. Therefore we must look upon them as purely 
natural coincidences which count for nothing and prove 
nothing. 

The importance of these so-called analogies as evi- 
dence vanishes when we come to consider that there are 
as many points of resemblance between the Indians and 
other peoples as there are between them and the children 
of Israel. And this shows that by this argument they 
can be connected with almost every race under the sun. 
Bradford devotes an entire chapter (Chapter X.) of his 
work, "American Antiquities," to these analogies, and 
cites a great number between the American Indians and 
the Celts, inhabitants of Madagascar, Etrurians, Egyp- 
tians, Hindoos, Mongols, Chinese and Malays. 

The inhabitants of Madagascar, he says, are physic- 
ally approximated to the red race ; they are divided into 
tribes; they trace their descent in the female line (a 
custom so distinctly American that it exceeds in impor- 
tance and force any analogy that the advocates of the 
Jewish theory have ever cited) ; they revere the dead; 
they scrape the flesh from the bones of the corpse; they 
bury the weapons of war and the wealth of the deceased 
with him ; they erect tumuli over their graves ; they sur- 



212 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



round their towns with embankments ; they attribute dis- 
ease to the agency of evil spirits, and they practice 
divination. 

The Mongols, like the Americans, are fond of danc- 
ing ; use the bow ; girdle trees ; practice polygamy ; pur- 
chase their wives ; suspend their dead from the branches 
of trees or place them on scaffolds ; tattoo ; wear moc- 
casins; are fond of smoking; shave their heads, with the 
exception of the scalplock; practice scalping; sacrifice 
dogs ; use the vapor bath ; bury their dead in a sitting 
posture; wear plumes; store corn in the ground; use the 
fire-drill; make use of the quippu ; prohibit the marriage 
of persons of the same clan, and preserve the skulls of 
their enemies. 

And the Malays, like the Americans, use the quippu ; 
tattoo ; compress the heads of their infants ; bury their 
dead in a sitting posture ; embalm and exsiccate the body ; 
preserve skulls ; have amulets and charms ; wear masks 
in their religious ceremonies ; use poisoned arrows, and 
put to death the relatives of the deceased. 

These analogies are as striking as any that have been 
pointed out between the Indians and the Jews, and if the 
Jewish analogies prove a Jewish descent, the Madagas- 
caran, Mongolian and Malayan analogies prove a Mada- 
gascaran, Mongolian and Malayan descent. And this 
would be fatal to the theory of the Book of Mormon. 

A number of forceful objections may also be raised 
against the opinion that the American Indians are of 
Jewish descent. 

I. There is positively no physical likeness between the 
two peoples. They are unlike in the form of their skulls, 
generally speaking, in physiognomy, in complexion and 
in color and texture of hair. Says Bradford: "More- 
over, the physical types of the two races are essentially 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



213 



different, and we know of no effect of climate by which 
the Hebrew could have been transformed into the red 
and beardless American." — American Antiquities, p. 240. 

2. The American tribes from the Arctic to the Ant- 
arctic possess no traces of a former belief in one God or 
a monotheistic worship, all reports to the contrary being 
false, as proved by the researches of such critical eth- 
nologists as Gallatin, Tylor, Parkman, Brinton and 
Powell. The highest form of theism in America was 
polytheism, the more civilized nations all having ex- 
tensive pantheons. 

3. Israelitish society, in its structure, was radically 
different from American society. In Palestine the social 
unit was the family ; in America it was the gens or clan. 
A gens is defined by Powell to be "an organized body of 
consanguineal kindred in the female line." A clan was 
such a body tracing descent in the male line. Descent, 
however, in the female line was far more common, and 
Brinton mentions the Algonkins, Iroquois, Cherokees, 
Chata Muskokis, Catawbas, Natchez, Mandans, Min- 
netarees and Kolosch as practicing it. Frequently a 
number of gentes made up a phratry, or brotherhood, 
and a number of these composed the tribe, as with the 
Wyandots, who were divided into eleven gentes, com- 
posing four phratries, and the whole constituting the 
tribe. 1 This social peculiarity is radical and fundamental 
and is hard to be accounted for if the Indians are of 
Israel. Why they should have lost all traces of a former 
Jewish social polity and should have retained a number 
of unimportant customs is inexplicable. 

4. The American languages have no affinity whatever 
with the Hebrew. They belong to an entirely different 



1 "The American Race," p. 45. 



214 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



linguistic group. Besides, their diversity is so great as 
positively to preclude the possibility of a derivation from 
that source at least at as recent a date as 600 B. C. 

5. No authentic Hebrew relics have ever been found 
in America. The "Newark Tablet," with its Hebrew 
inscription and its "truculent likeness" of Moses, which 
created such a stir in archaeological circles forty years 
ago, is proved to be a fraud, perpetrated by David 
Wyrick, a half -crazed surveyor of Newark, Ohio, who, 
disappointed at not finding evidence of the Jewish origin 
of the American Indians, determined to manufacture 
some. Although the fraudulent character of this tablet 
has been unquestionably established, Mormon writers and 
speakers persist in referring to it as though its character 
had never been questioned. 1 

6. There is no evidence by which to prove that the 
American nations ever reached the culture status of the 
Hebrews. They did not use either iron or steel and they 
were wholly unacquainted with the use of the plummets. 2 

7. It is certain that the builders of the ancient cities 
of Central America and Mexico and the mounds of the 
United States did not have the horse and other domestic 
animals mentioned in the Book of Mormon, for their 
remains have never been found among any of the an- 
tiquities, neither have their forms been etched or carved 
on any relic so far discovered. That the horse was an 
inhabitants of the New World before Columbus I do not 
deny, for its remains have been found in the deposits of 
the earlier ages, but that it was here during the time that 
the cities of Central America and the mounds of the Mis- 

1 "Joseph the Seer," pp. 155-160. "The Book Unsealed," pp. 28-31. 
"Truth Defended," pp. 130, 131. "Book of Mormon Lectures," pp. 255, 
256. "Parsons' Text-book," pp. 25, 26. 

2 "Essays of an Americanist," p. 442. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



215 



sissippi Valley were being built I deny, as there is no 
evidence whatever to sustain it. 

8. The aboriginal arts, customs, habits, ceremonies 
and institutions of the American race bear the marks of 
utter barbarism and of their indigenous development. 
The slight similarities to the arts, customs, habits, cere- 
monies and institutions of the Old World which appear 
fade away before a careful, scientific comparison. They 
are found to have no connection with each other and are 
to be explained as purely natural coincidences. 

9. The myths and traditions of the Americans that 
have come down to us are so different from those of 
Hebrew lore that no student of to-day assigns to them a 
Hebrew origin. Let the reader consult Brinton's "Myths 
of the New World," and the truthfulness of this asser- 
tion will be observed. 

In the light of these facts, I contend that it can not 
be maintained that the American Indians are of Jewish 
descent, as claimed in the Book of Mormon. 



2l6 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



CHAPTER V. 

Were the Ancient Central Americans and Mexicans the Jaredites 
and Nephites? — The Color of the Ancient Central Americans 
and Mexicans — The Culture of the First Inhabitants of 
Central America — The Direction of Migration of the Ancient 
Peoples — The Contact of the Ancient Central Americans and 
Mexicans — The First Civilized People Not Exterminated — 
The Extent of the Ancient Empires — Traditional History of 
the Toltecs. 

The ancient civilization of Central America and Mex- 
ico is to be ascribed to two distinct peoples, the Mayas 
and Nahuas. That there were other tribes which pos- 
sessed considerable advancement is not to be doubted, 
but, as these exerted the widest influence and played' the 
leading parts in those regions, antiquarians are wont to 
divide primitive culture into two branches, the Mayan 
and Nahuan. 

Bancroft says: "Notwithstanding evident marks of 
similarity in nearly all the manifestations of the progres- 
sional spirit in aboriginal America, in art, thought and 
religion, there is much reason for and convenience in 
referring all the native civilization to two branches, the 
Maya and the Nahua, the former the more ancient, the 
latter the more recent and widespread." — Native Races, 
Vol. II., pp. 90, 91. 

And Short says of these peoples: "The venerable 
civilization of the Mayas, whose forest-grown cities and 
crumbling temples hold entombed a history of vanished 
glory, no doubt belongs to the remotest period of North 
American antiquity. It was old when the Nahuas, then 
a comparatively rude people, first came in contact with 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



217 



it, adopted many of its features, and grafted upon it new 
life." — North Americans of Antiquity, p. 519. 

Whether or not these peoples were related is not 
known. They differed widely from one another in lan- 
guage, monuments and hieroglyphics, and their points of 
resemblance were only such as could be due to contact ; 
hence ethnologists are led to the conclusion that, if these 
stocks are related, their separation from one another 
must have occurred at a very late date, after which they 
developed their culture in different channels. 

The Mayas are supposed to have come originally from 
the north. They are known to some writers as the Col- 
huas, and these apply the name Maya only to that branch 
of their descendants who inhabit Yucatan. Tradition and 
archaeology agree in affirming that they were the builders 
of the cities of Yucatan not only, but also of the more 
ancient cities of Palenque, Copan and Quirigua in Chi- 
apas, Honduras and Guatemala. 

The Nahuas were an enterprising branch of the great 
Uto-Aztecan family. Their traditions say that they en- 
tered Mexico and Central America after the Mayas, 
coming from the north. Their history is usually divided 
into four periods or epochs : the pre-Toltecan, previous 
to the sixth century ; the Toltecan, from the sixth to the 
eleventh century; the Chichimecan, from the eleventh to 
the fifteenth century, and the Aztecan, from the fifteenth 
century to the Spanish Conquest. 1 The Toltecs, accord- 
ing to tradition, were their most cultured and progressive 
tribe, and the Aztec bards never tired of singing of their 
golden age. Dr. Brinton denies that the Toltecs, as they 
are commonly described, ever existed, and claims that 
they were only an unimportant gens of the Azteca. 2 



1 "Native Races," Vol. V., pp. 157, 158. 

2 "Essays of an Americanist," pp. 83-100. 



2l8 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Most ethnologists, however, clo not share in this conclu- 
sion, and consider them a bona-fide tribe. 

Mormon writers declare that the ancient civilized 
peoples of Central America and Mexico, those who 
erected the prehistoric cities of those regions, were the 
Jaredites and Xephites. 

Elder Stebbins says : "And when they come forward 
and tell us that the more ancient ruins were built upon 
by a people later, whose manners of construction and 
of architecture were different from those of the former 
people, showing that there were two civilizations and two 
periods in the history of the country, what can I say but 
that they were the Jaredites and the Xephites, just as the 
Book of Mormon tells us they were?" — Book of Mormon 
Lectures, p. 45. 

Elder Etzenhouser, another Mormon archaeologist, 
writes : "We have now presented Short, Pidgeon and 
Bancroft, three eminent authorities, on there having been 
two distinct peoples, and who preceded the aborigines of 
America, in the possession of this land, which supports 
the claim of the Book of Mormon for the Jaredite and 
Xephite colonizations." — The Book Unsealed, p. 10. 

And Miss Louise Palfrey says : "The only theory 
that will agree with all the facts and circumstances of 
archaeological source, and that is compelled to invent no 
excuses, overlook or discard no prominent feature of 
tradition, relic or ruin, is that there were two distinct 
civilizations before the time of the Aztecs and the 
Incas, one preceding the other and confining its limits 
to Xorth America, while the seat of its highest develop- 
ment, hence its greatest age, was in Central America.'' 
— Divinity of the Book of Mormon Proven by Archaeol- 
ogy, p. 178. 

But the fact that research has shown that two distinct 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



peoples controlled, in ancient times, the regions where 
the principal ruins are found, in numerical agreement 
with the Book of Mormon, is not in itself sufficient to 
prove that they were the Jaredites and Nephites, the 
point these writers so gratuitously assume. There are 
several forceful objections that must be removed before 
Jared can be identified with Votan, or the land of Moron 
be proved to have been the empire of Xibalba, or the 
Nephites be identified with the Toltecs. 

But I am ready to grant that, if the Jaredites and 
Nephites are to be identified with any New World 
nations at all, they must be with the Mayas and Nahuas, 
for these peoples, judging by the monuments, came the 
nearest to reaching the stage of culture described in the 
Book of Mormon of any nation in America, with the ex- 
ception possibly of the Peruvians, and their history 
covers at least a portion of the time in which the Book of 
Mormon claims that those regions in which they were 
located were inhabited by its peoples. 

If the identification which Mormon writers make of 
the builders of the ancient cities of Central America and 
Mexico with the Jaredites and Nephites be well founded, 
the ethnologist is confronted with a number of facts 
which will materially affect many of the conclusions at 
which he has arrived. If these authors are correct, the 
following conclusions are true : the distant ancestors of 
the Aztecs, Mayas, Quiches and Cakchiquels were of the 
Caucasian race ; the Colhuas, or Mayas, were the first 
inhabitants of the American continent, and came bring- 
ing with them the civilization of the Old World; they 
were totally exterminated, after sixteen centuries, in a 
long and disastrous war, the last battle of which was 
fought in western New York ; they were succeeded, after 
a few centuries, by the Toltecs, or Nahuas, who came 



220 



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from South America ; the governments of the two peo- 
ples were not confined in their jurisdiction to Mexico and 
Central America alone, but the northern boundary line 
of both was extended northward as far as the Great 
Lakes, while the southern boundary line of the second 
lay as far south, at least, as the southern limits of 
Colombia ; the two nations were here consecutively and 
not at the same time ; and the empire of the first came 
to an end in 600 B. C, while that of the second ended 
about 400 A. D. These are some of the conclusions that 
must be reached if the "two distinct peoples" of Bancroft 
and Short were the Jaredites and Nephites. 

But, on these conclusions, archaeologists will not agree 
with Mormon writers ; every one of them is contradicted 
by the facts derived from the traditions of the people and 
from archaeological research. 

THERE IS PROOF THAT THE ANCIENT RACES OF CENTRAL 
AMERICA AND MEXICO WERE IDENTICAL WITH 
THE PRESENT AMERICAN. 

The Mayas and Aztecs, at the time of the Spanish 
Conquest, were described as well- formed races of a 
tawny color. As they were erecting the same kinds of 
edifices, using the same kinds of hieroglyphics, worship- 
ing the same gods, practicing the same arts and com- 
puting time by means of the same calendar system as 
their predecessors, we set out with the presumption that 
they were like them in color and physical features — the 
same race. And this presumption can only be set aside 
by well-founded, not inferential, evidence. 

These tribes had well-preserved traditions of the im- 
portant events in their history, which reached back to, 
at least, their advents into the central region. While, 
so far as their chronology is concerned, these traditions 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



221 



can not be depended upon, many of the events they 
record are known to have transpired by the corrobora- 
tory evidences of the monuments. The traditions tell 
us of the founding- of the Maya and Toltec empires, of 
the erection of their capital cities, of the introduction of 
new religious ideas, of the progress and prosperity of 
the people and of the subsequent breaking up of nations 
and scattering of tribes, all of which accounts have been 
fully corroborated from monumental and linguistic 
sources. Yet not a hint is thrown out in any tradition 
that the ancestors of the Mexican and Central American 
races were white and that they were transformed in color 
to coppery by a miracle. Such a miracle, widely known 
of in 420 A. D., could hardly have failed of being trans- 
mitted in the traditions of the country to the time of the 
Conquest. 

The crania of the country present no diversities by 
which the ancient may be distinguished from the modern 
races. The same conformations and deformations of 
skull observed among the tribes at the time of the Con- 
quest are to be seen in the crania from the ancient burial- 
places. On certain remains taken from the ancient 
sepulchres at Ticul, Yucatan, Bancroft remarks : "The 
skeletons and skulls dug up at Ticul were pronounced by 
Dr. Morton to belong to the universal American type." — 
Native Races, Vol. IV., p. 282. 

One of the peculiar customs of the inhabitants of this 
part of the continent was that of flattening the fore- 
head by pressure. This practice was in vogue when 
the Spaniards first came, and the deformation of the 
skull was looked upon as a mark of beauty and refine- 
ment. But this same custom was practiced by the ancient 
races, and this would imply a continuity of race from the 
earliest times to the present. "That it was practiced to a 



222 



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considerable extent," says Bancroft, "in remote times by 
people inhabiting the country, seems to be shown by the 
deformed skulls found in their graves, and by the sculp- 
tured figures upon the ruins." — Native Races, Vol. II., 
p. 281. 

Another evidence of the ethnical identity of the 
ancient and modern inhabitants is in the faces sculptured 
in profile upon the monuments of the country. That these 
are the faces of the native population is not to be doubted, 
while their dress, ornamentation and attitude indicate that 
they are representations of priests, warriors and states- 
men. 

Galindo says of the carved faces on the monuments 
of Palenque : "The physiognomies of the human figure in 
alto relievo indicate that they represent a race not differ- 
ing from the modern Indians ; they were, perhaps, taller 
than the latter, who are of a middle or rather small stat- 
ure, compared with Europeans." — Travels in Mexico, p. 
163. 

The bas-reliefs of Yucatan are also declared by Na- 
daillac to show features plainly Indian. "The bas-reliefs 
are remarkable ; all the faces are of the present Yucatan 
type, and contrast strongly with the pointed heads and 
retreating foreheads represented at Palenque, and which 
are said to be still met with amongst the inferior moun- 
tain races." — Prehistoric America, p. 341. 

Reclus, in speaking of these same bas-reliefs, re- 
marks: "The type of such figures is the same as that of 
the present natives, especially the Eastern Lancandons, 
except that it is highly exaggerated, especially in the 
temples of Palenque." — The Earth and Its Inhabitants, 
Vol. II., p. 160. 

Again, the figures that these ancient peoples moulded 
of themselves out of clay possess Indian physiognomies. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



22$ 



Certain of these images from the mounds of Zachila, 
Oajaca and Cuilapa are said by Bancroft to agree in 
features with the Zapotecs, the present inhabitants of 
those localities. "Those figures which are moulded in 
human form agree in features with the Zapotec features 
of modern times." — Native Races, Vol. IV., p. 376. 

And, lastly, as indicative of the direct relationship of 
the ancient and modern races, we have their paintings in 
which the human figure is painted reddish brown. Says 
Short : "Blue, red, yellow and green are the colors em- 
ployed, though the human figures are painted reddish 
brown." 

With these facts before him, the reader will observe 
that archaeological evidence is opposed to the theory that 
the ancient peoples, those who built the cities of Central 
America and Mexico, were of the Caucasian race. 

THE FIRST PEOPLE OF CENTRAL AMERICA WERE SAVAGES 
OF THE LOWEST TYPE. 

This is directly contrary to the teachings of the Book 
of Mormon and to the theory of its defenders, according 
to which the first Americans were highly-civilized immi- 
grants from the Tower of Babel. Apostle Kelley says 
of them : "They brought with them the civilization, the 
arts, sciences, habits, customs, traditions and language 
of their day and time." — Presidency and Priesthood, p. 

2S 8. 

They are said to have landed upon the east coast of 
Central America, "near the mouth of the river Motagua," 
and to have "finally fixed their capital (Moron) at what 
is now known as the ruins of Copan on the Copan River, 
Honduras ; possibly it was at Quirigua, on the Motagua 
River, Guatemala." — Report of the Committee on Amer- 
ican Archaeology, p. 70. As the two old Mayan cities, 



224 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



Copan and Quirigua, stand about an equal show with the 
Committee of being Moron, it is evident that they look 
upon the ancient Mayas as being identical with the 
Jaredites. 

But the theory that the first inhabitants of Honduras 
and Guatemala were civilized peoples is opposed by the 
traditions of the natives. Votan, the white and bearded 
civilizer, who is said to have come from over the sea, is 
declared to have found that country inhabited by a race 
of people known under the general name of Chichimecs, 
"dogs," who were savage? of the lowest type, building 
no cities, having no agriculture, eating their meat raw, 
and, for refuge from the storms, fleeing to the recesses 
of the forests and to the caves of the mountains. And, 
whether we consider Votan a real person or a mytho- 
logical character, the fact remains the same, that the 
civilized Mayas had savage predecessors who preceded 
them in the valley of the Usumacinta. 

Nadaillac says : "The most ancient traditions made 
him come from a land of shadow, beyond the seas ; on 
his arrival, the inhabitants of the vast territories stretch- 
ing between the Isthmus of Panama and California lived 
in a state which may be compared with that of the people 
of the stone age of Europe. A few natural caves, huts 
made of branches of trees, served them as shelter; their 
only garments were skins obtained in the chase ; they 
lived upon wild fruits, roots torn out of the ground and 
raw flesh of animals which they devoured while still 
bloody." — Prehistoric America, p. 264. 

With this Baldwin agrees : "According to these writ- 
ings, the country where the ruins are found was occu- 
pied in successive periods by three distinct peoples, the 
Chichimecs, the Colhuas and the Toltecs, or Nahuas." — 
Ancient America, p. 198. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



225 



Of the first people he says : "The most ancient people, 
those found in the country by the Colhuas, are called 
Chichimecs. They are described as a barbarous people 
who lived by hunting and fishing, and had neither towns 
nor agriculture." — Ibid. 

The Committee on American Archaeology tell us that 
the Colhuas were the Jaredites and the Toltecs the 
Nephites. Who, then, were the Chichimecs, the people 
who were here before the Colhuas came? 

THE CIVILIZED NATIONS OF CENTRAL AMERICA AND 
MEXICO CAME FROM THE NORTH. 

With the Book of Mormon the direction of aboriginal 
migration was from south to north in both Americas ; 
but, if we follow traditional, linguistic and archaeological 
indications, we must conclude that the ancient nations of 
Central America and Mexico came from the opposite 
direction. 

1. The traditions of the Mayas and Nahuas declare 
that they came originally from a more northern latitude. 

Brinton says of the Maya tradition: "The uniform 
assertion of these legends is that the ancestors of the 
stock came from a more northern latitude, following 
down the shore of the Gulf of Mexico. This is also 
supported by the position of the Huastecs, who may be 
regarded as one of their tribes left behind in the general 
migration, and by the tradition of the Nahuas which 
assigned them a northern origin." — The American Race, 
P- 154. 

Mrs. Susan Hale sums up the accounts of the migra- 
tions of the various pre-Chichimecan tribes from the 
north in the following: "We can not stop to be very 
much interested in this rudimentary people, called Qui- 
names, who have left us scarcely more than a name and 



226 



CUMORAH REVISiT^^ 



little even of legend to charm us. . . . Whence they came, 
therefore, it is vain to speculate: how long they were 
there, what manner of men they were. A wave of life 
more civilized swept down upon them from the north 
and exterminated the whole race, so that we have noth- 
ing more to tell about them. The tribes which have the 
credit of destroying the giants bear the names of Xica- 
lancas and Ulmecs. . . . Next came the Mayas, still 
always from the north. Although they left some traces 
upon Anahuac, they, too, moved farther on, to establish 
in Yucatan and the territory between Chiapas and Cen- 
tral America their greatly advanced civilization. The 
Otomies, still with the same northern origin, spread 
themselves very early over the territory which is now 
occupied by the states of San Luis, Potosi, Guanajuato 
and Queretaro, reaching Michoacan, and spreading still 
farther. . . . Mixtecas and Zapotecas are names of other 
people who came to occupy Anahuac, but the Toltecs are 
the first of these ancient tribes distinguished for the 
advancement of their arts and civilization, of which their 
monuments and the results of excavation give abundant 
proof. The legends of those tribes who came to Mexico 
over the broad path leading down from the north refer 
to an ancient home, of which they retained a sad, vague 
longing, as the Moor still dreams of the glories of Gren- 
ada." — The Story of Mexico, pp. 18, 19. 

And Nadaillac says : "All these men, whether Toltecs, 
Chichimecs or Aztecs, believed that their people came 
from the north, and migrated southward, seeking more 
fertile lands, more genial climates, or, perhaps, driven 
before a more warlike race ; one wave of emigration suc- 
ceeding another." — Prehistoric America, p. 13. 

So prevalent was this tradition among the Nahuatl 
tribes of the sixteenth century that even Bancroft, who 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



22J 



denies their northern origin, is forced to admit it. "It 
is not probable," he says, "that this idea of a northern 
origin was a pure invention of the Spaniards; they 
doubtless found among the Aztecs with whom they came 
in contact what seemed to them a prevalent popular 
notion that the ancestors of the race came from the 
north." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 217. 

And yet Elder Walker, in the face of this widely 
stated tradition, has the boldness to say : "By the ruins 
and traditions, it appears that the Olmecs, Toltecs, Az- 
tecs, et aL, can be traced through Central America to 
Peru." — Ruins Revisited, p. 150. A statement that no 
man can truthfully make who is familiar with the tradi- 
tions. 

2. The languages of the Mayas and Nahuas prove 
that they came originally from the north. 

It is an indisputable fact that both the Maya and 
Nahuatl tongues are related to the tongues of tribes who 
dwell to the northward and whose traditions declare that 
they came from regions still farther north. The Mayas 
are connected with the Huastecs who reside on the Rio 
Panuco, and the Nahuas with the Sonorans and Shosho- 
nians whose tribes are scattered as far to the north as 
the Columbia River. 

On the relationship of the Nahuas to northern stocks, 
and what this fact proves as to their southerly move- 
ment, Thomas writes: "If Buschmann be correct in 
uniting the Ute or Shoshone group of dialects with and 
making them a part of the Nahuatl or Mexican stock, 
named by Dr. Brinton the 'Uto-Aztecan Stock,' we have, 
in the spread of this extensive family, what would seem 
to be incontrovertible evidence of the tendency in this 
western section to southern movements. Members of 
this family are scattered from the vicinity of the Colum- 



228 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



bia River to the Isthmus of Panama ; and so far as any 
evidence has been found in regard to the movements of 
the tribes, it indicates they were southward." — American 
Archaeology, p. 316. 

The indications are that the Uto-Aztecan family, of 
which the Nahuan, Sonoran and Shoshonian are the 
branches, had its origin at some point between the Rocky 
Mountains and the Great Lakes. This is the conclusion 
of Dr. Gibbs, arrived at after an exhaustive study, and 
has also been reached by both Dr. Brinton and Professor 
Thomas, after independent research. 

Brinton says : "That very careful student, Mr. George 
Gibbs, from a review of all the indications, reached the 
conclusion that the whole group came originally from 
the east of the Rocky Mountain chain, and that the 
home of its ancestral horde was somewhere between 
these mountains and the Great Lakes. This is the opin- 
ion I have also reached from an independent study of 
the subject, and I believe it is as near as we can get to 
the birthplace of this important stock." — The American 
Race, p. 121. 

Of the branches of this stock, the Nahuas were the 
first to move southward, stopping for some time in the 
region of the Gila, where they created the germ of that 
culture which afterwards reached its highest point of 
development in central and southern Mexico, and then 
poured down upon Anahuac in successive waves, the 
Olmecs and Xicalancas leading, then the Toltecs, then 
the Chichimecs, and, lastly, the Aztecs and kindred tribes. 
The great Nahuan branch was followed by the Sonoran, 
which dwelt, at the time of the Discovery, in the States 
of Sonora, Sinaloa, Chihuahua and Durango ; while the 
Shoshonians came last and took up their residence cn 
the Columbia River and in adjacent territory. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



229 



3. The architecture of the Mayas and Nahuas proves 
that they must have originally come from the north. 

It was long a favorite opinion with archaeologists that 
the civilization of Central America was indigenous to 
that section, and it was assumed that that region had been 
a sort of radiating center from which the various nations 
went out to people the New World. 1 But this assumption 
will have to be relinquished, for it is now known that 
Central America not only did not germinate the culture 
of the other regions of America, where men had reached 
a considerable degree of advancement, but that she de- 
rived her own civilization from without. This is proved 
by the fact that the successive steps, the rude beginnings 
and the intermediate stages of a developing architectural 
art, found in Egypt and other countries where civiliza- 
tions have been begun and carried to a high degree, are 
wholly wanting in Chiapas and Yucatan. The Mayas, 
when they entered the central region, were artisans and 
mechanics with advanced ideas of architecture. "How 
are we to account for this absence of earlier forms," 
asks Thomas, "except upon the theory that when the 
tribes entered their historic seats they had already be- 
come proficient in the builder's art?" — American Archae- 
ology, p. 341. 

When the works of Mexico and Central America are 
carefully studied, it is observed that there is a general 
architectural improvement from the Gila on the north 
to the Usumacinta on the south, as though there had 
been a constant but slow trend of population southward. 
A line of continually developing architectural forms may 
be traced from the region of the Gila, in Arizona, 
through Casas Grandes, in the State of Chihuahua, and 



1 "Prehistoric Races," pp. 339, 340, 



230 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



Zape, in Zacatecas, to Mexico, and from thence to Chi- 
apas and Yucatan. This route, evidently, was the ancient 
thoroughfare over which the Mayas and Nahuas trav- 
eled on their way to Anahuac and Central America. The 
initial efforts at pyramid and terrace building, carried to 
so high a grade in Central America, were made on the 
Gila, as is evidenced in the mounds and artificial plat- 
forms there to be found. At Casas Grandes, while in 
general type the architecture is unquestionably like that 
of Arizona, transitional forms appear, and, by the time 
Quemada is reached, the impress of a northern influence 
becomes fainter with more of a tendency toward Cen- 
tral American forms. These facts prove that the monu- 
ments from the Gila to Honduras were erected by the 
same people, or related peoples, who moved by slow 
stages, and frequent stops, southward, increasing in 
power and civilization on the way. This is the easiest 
and best explanation of the transitional architectural 
forms of northern and southern Mexico. 1 

To fortify this argument, I here introduce the testi- 
mony of three as competent archaeologists as have ever 
written on the subject of antiquities, at least two of 
whom have made careful personal investigations on the 
field. 

Thomas says : "In fact, the evidence of gradual ad- 
vance toward a higher grade in the architectural art is 
seen beyond question as we advance southward from Ari- 
zona to Quemada, be our opinion in regard to the authors 
of these works what it may. We must confess that, so 
far as we are able to judge from all that has been written 
in regard to the ruins of the southwest, there seems to be 
no other reason for denying this advance in type than a 



* "American Archaeology," Chapter XXIII. 



CUMORAII REVISITED 



231 



fixed purpose to maintain a theory." — American Archae- 
ology, p. 349- 

In support of his belief, he gives us a quotation from 
the well-known archaeologist, Bandelier, part of which is 
as follows : "It seems, therefore, that between the thirty- 
fourth and the twenty-ninth parallels of latitude the 
aboriginal architecture of the southwest had begun to 
change in a manner that brought some of its elements 
that were of northern origin into disuse, and substituted 
others derived from southern influences ; in other words, 
that there was a gradual transformation going on in 
ancient aboriginal architecture in the direction from 
north to south." — Ibid, p. 350. 

He also gives us the following from Charnay: "Las 
Casas Grandes, the settlements in the Sierra Madre, the 
ruins of Zape, of Quemada, recalling the monuments at 
Mitla, others in Queretaro, together with certain fea- 
tures in the building of temples and altars which remind 
one of the Mexican manuscripts, from which the Toltec, 
Aztec and Yucatec temple was built, make it clear that 
the civilized races came from the northwest." — Ibid, p. 
349- 

The name of the ancient country from which the 
Maya and Nahua tribes are said to have come is given 
differently in the traditions. The Toltecs called it Hue 
Hue Tlapallan, "Old Old Red Land;" the Chichimecs, 
Amequemecan, and the Aztecs, Aztlan, "White Land," 
or Chicomoztoc, "Seven Caves," while the Mayas spoke 
of it as Tulan Zuiva, or "Seven Ravines." It was 
vaguely located in the north somewhere and was to the 
tribes of Mexico and Central America what Palestine is 
to the Jew and Grenada to the Moor. Archaeologists 
have been puzzled to know just where in the north to 
locate it and varied have been their conjectures. Bald- 



232 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



win, Foster and Short have looked for it in the Missis- 
sippi Valley and have identified the Mexican and Central 
American tribes with those who built the mounds, but 
recent discoveries, by which the tribes resident in the 
valleys at the time of the Discovery are identified with 
the Mound Builders, have effectually refuted this theory. 
Briart claims a location for it near Lake Tulare in Cali- 
fornia, Becker on the Rio Colorado, and Humboldt on 
the Gila. 

Of all these theories, and many others that might be 
mentioned, the last two are the most probable. The con- 
stant mention of caves and ravines in the old accounts 
may refer to the manner of life followed by the tribes, 
when they resided in the north, of living in cliffs and 
caves, while the colors red and white, by which the 
ancient country was designated by the Toltecs and Az- 
tecs, may refer to the color of the cliffs or mountains. 
On this point Professor Thomas writes : "Why there has 
been such persistent refusal on the part of scholars to 
accept, as at least possible, the theory that the tradition 
of the 'Seven Caves' or 'Seven Ravines' (Chicomoztoc 
and Tulan Zuiva) refers to the cliff dwellings or cave 
dwellings of northwestern Mexico and Arizona, is dif- 
ficult to account for. There is nothing in this supposi- 
tion contrary to the traditions, nor to the generally 
accepted theory of the course of migrations. The num- 
ber seven does not necessarily play any particular role in 
the solution of this problem. Numbers were determined 
from some incident or circumstance which may or may 
not be known. Seven may have been selected because of 
some superstition, or because it was understood that 
seven was the number of tribes belonging to a certain 
group or stock, or it may have arisen in many other 
ways. It is, therefore, immaterial in this relation. The 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



233 



reference, therefore, in the Nahuatl and Maya traditions 
to seven caves, although largely mixed with myth, may 
be interpreted as possibly referring to the cliff or cave 
dwellings, or to this mode of living while in the north. 
This would be appropriate as explaining the frequent 
reference in these traditions to darkness, gloom and a 
sunless condition. It is well known that caves were 
often resorted to in the southern regions as places for 
holding religious ceremonies and other purposes." — 
American Archaeology, p. 355. 

It is also a fact of history that many of the towns on 
the southern Gila were deserted in 1540 when Coronado 
visited them ; these and others, which have not yet been 
discovered, may have been among the works of the old 
Mayan and Nahuan tribes. Besides, it is now known 
that tribes of the Uto-Aztecan family, notably the Mokis 
of the Shoshonian and the Pimas of the Sonoran branch, 
have built cliff houses within historic times. Putting 
these facts all together, we have pretty strong proof that 
the Mayas and the Nahuas came from the north not 
only, but also that the ancient country in which they 
began to lead a life of civilization was somewhere in the 
northwestern part of Mexico, or in the southwestern 
part of the United States. 

The most prominent opponent of the northern origin 
of the Nahuatl tribes is Bancroft. For several reasons 
he opposed the theory and tried to find Hue Hue Tlapal- 
lan in the Usumacinta region and to connect the Toltecs 
with Xibalba. He did not, however, bring them from 
south of the Isthmus, and so his theory can not be made 
to do service in the interest of the Book of Mormon. 
He argued that no ruins had been discovered in the 
north which could have been the initial steps in Maya 
and Nahua architecture, and that no Aztec or Maya dia- 



234 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



lects had been found in that direction ; both of which 
conclusions, since his day, have positively been proved 
untrue, as we have seen. 1 Many more of his opinions 
in nowise conflict with the theory of a northern deriva- 
tion. 

The consensus of opinion among scientific men upon 
the origin of the Maya and Nahua tribes is, however, 
that they came from the north to those countries which 
they inhabited in historic times. 

"The Toltecs directed their course toward the south." 
— Briarfs Aztecs, p. 38. 

"It results from the evidences in our possession that 
there has existed a continuous and general tendency of 
migration from north to south in the two Americas." — 
Preadamites, p. 395. 

"Here, again, enters speculation upon the location of 
that country of the Toltecs. No one knows certainly 
where it was, but everything points to its having been 
in the north." — Ober's History of Mexico, p. 26. 

"When the Toltecs, who led the van of the great 
Aztec migration from the north, settled in Mexico, they 
are said to have found it inhabited by the Olmecas or 

1 Since writing this I have come across a statement from Bancroft in 
which he concedes that there is no good reason why the foundations of 
the Nahua and Maya civilizations may not have been laid in the North- 
west. In opposing the theory of Buckle, that the development of civiliza- 
tion is dependent upon the heat and moisture of the tropics, he says 
(Vol. II., p. 53) : "Indeed, there is no reason why the foundations of the 
Aztec and Maya-Quiche civilizations may not have been laid north of the 
thirty-fifth parallel, although no architectural remains have been discovered 
there, nor any other proof of such an origin; but upon the banks of the 
Gila, the Colorado, and the Rio Grande, in Chihuahua, and on the dry, 
hot plains of Arizona and New Mexico, far beyond the limits of Mr. 
Buckle's territory where 'there never has been found, and we may con- 
fidently assert, never will be found,' any evidence of progress, are to-day 
walled towns inhabited by an industrial and agricultural people, whose 
existence we can trace back for more than three centuries, besides ruins 
of massive buildings of whose history nothing is known." 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



235 



Olmees, a nation to which the learned Siguenza ascribed 
the construction of the pyramids of Teotihuacan." — ■ 
American Antiquities, p. 200. 

"The Toltecs arrived in Anahuac, or the country 
now called Mexico, migrating from the north." — Types 
of Mankind, p. 286. 

"Before the Christian era the Nahoa immigration 
from the north made its appearance." — The Mound 
Builders, p. 147. 

"No reasonable doubt exists but that the Athapascas, 
Algonkins, Iroquois, Chahta-Muskokis and Nahuas all 
migrated from the north or west to the regions they 
occupied." — Myths of the New World, p. 47. 

"The prevailing opinion among scholars of the pres- 
ent day, so far as published, appears to be that the 
Nahuatl group originated in, or at least came from some 
place north of, the known localities of the tribes com- 
posing the family." — American Archaeology, p. 316. 

We have three lines of evidence, then, which refute 
the Book of Mormon claim that the ancient inhabitants 
of Central America and Mexico came from over the sea 
and from South America. First, the traditions ; second, 
the languages, and, third, the architectural features. 
These evidences strongly declare that the ancient Mayas 
and Nahuas came from the north. 

THE ANCIENT MAYAS AND NAHUAS WERE NEAR NEIGH- 
BORS, CAME CONSTANTLY IN CONTACT, AND WERE LONG 
IN INTIMATE ASSOCIATION WITH EACH OTHER. 

The Jaredites are declared to have landed upon 
American soil in the year 2224 B. C, and to have been 
here until the year 600 B. C, when they were extermi- 
nated at Hill Ramah in western New York. The Ne- 
phites, we are told, immediately followed them and con- 



236 



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tinued until 385 A. D., when they suffered defeat at the 
hands of the Lamanites. The Jaredites and Xephites 
are said to have been distinct peoples and never to have 
come in contact, except in the case of the Jaredite 
Coriantumr, who survived the destruction of his people 
and who dwelt with the Zarahemlaites "nine moons." 

But the American traditions show that the two 
ancient civilized peoples of Central America and Mexico 
were here at the same time, were near neighbors, were 
often at war with each other, and exerted a mutual 
influence in the development of their respective civiliza- 
tions. 

Says Short: "The pyramidal structure we have found 
employed by both Mayas and Xahuas, with certain mod- 
ifications and with such resemblances as would seem to 
indicate that both peoples had been originally, or at an 
early day, near neighbors, and that the younger people, 
at least the more recent in their occupancy of Mexico 
and Central America, the Xahuas, may have copied the 
pyramid in its perfected form from the Mayas/' — North 
Americans on Antiquity, p. 224. 

Says Bancroft: "First, as already stated, the Maya 
and Xahua nations have been within traditionally his- 
toric times practically distinct, although coming con- 
stantly in contact." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 166. 

And Thomas declares : "It is also generally conceded, 
or at least intimated, and apparently in accordance with 
the most reliable data, that the Mayas and Zapotecs, if 
not derived in the far distant past from the same original 
stem as the Xahuatl tribes, had long been in intimate 
association with the latter." — American Archaeology, p. 
354- 

This is a most forceful argument against the Mor- 
mon theory that the "two distinct people" of Central 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



237 



America and Mexico were the Jaredites and Nephites, 
for, if the Mayas and Nahuas were "near neighbors," 
came ''constantly in contact" and were in "intimate asso- 
ciation" with each other, they could not have been iden- 
tical with the Book of Mormon nations, who are said to 
have been here consecutively. 

Tradition further tells us that the Nahuas were the 
force that overthrew the old, effete empire of Xibalba. 
Bancroft sums up the historical facts, as given in the 
Quiche manuscript, the Popol Vuh, in the following: 
"The Quiche traditions, then, point clearly to, first, the 
existence in ancient times of a great empire somewhere 
in Central America, called Xibalba by its enemies ; sec- 
ond, the growth of a rival neighboring power; third, a 
long struggle extending through several generations at 
least, and resulting in the downfall of the Xibalban 
kings ; fourth, a subsequent scattering — the cause of 
which is not stated, but was evidently war, civil or for- 
eign — of the formerly victorious nations from Tulan, 
their chief city or province ; fifth, the identification of a 
portion of the migrating chiefs with the founders of the 
Quiche-Cakchiquel nations in possession of Guatemala 
at the Conquest." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 185. 

The facts, as gleaned from the fields of traditional 
history and archaeology, are as follows : Some hundreds of 
years ago, probably not earlier than the beginning of the 
Christian era, there appeared in Central America from 
the north a civilized people known to us as the Mayas, 
or Colhuas. These subjugated the barbarous tribes, 
taught them the arts of civilized life and established an 
empire, which, at the height of its glory, included under 
its sway the valley of the Usumacinta and adjacent terri- 
tory. When this people had become settled in their new 
home there appeared to the north of them a new people, 



238 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



speaking a new language, who settled in central and 
southern Mexico. The indications are that the two 
peoples lived peaceably side by side for some time, until 
the Nahuas had developed sufficient strength to over- 
throw the Votanic sovereigns. This was accomplished, 
however, only after a long and bloody struggle. Ban- 
croft speaks of this conflict as "a long struggle extend- 
ing through several generations at least, and resulting in 
the downfall of the Xibalban kings." — Native Races, 
Vol. V., p. 186. And Short says: "While we do not 
attach much certainty to the Abbe's" — DeBourbourg's — 
"date, still we think that the fall of Xibalba was due to 
Nahua influences brought to bear upon the ancestors of 
the Quiches." — North Americans of Antiquity, p. 227. 

The overthrow^ of this empire did not consist in the 
extermination of a people, but in the destruction of a 
government and the scattering of its subjects or their 
absorption among the victorious Nahuas. "The old 
civilization was merged in the new, and practically lost 
its identity ; so much so that all the many nationalities 
that in later times traced their origin to this central 
region were proud, whatever their language, to claim 
relationship with the successful Nahuas, whose institu- 
tions they had adopted and whose power they had 
shared." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 234. 

These facts are against the Book of Mormon. The 
Jaredites and Nephites never came in contact ; the latter 
had nothing to do with the downfall of the former ; and 
the first people, after their overthrow, were not merged 
with the second. We are justified, therefore, in conclu- 
ding that the Mayas and Nahuas were not the Jaredites 
and Nephites. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



239 



THE BUILDERS OF THE ANCIENT CITIES OF CENTRAL 
AMERICA ARE NOT AN EXTERMINATED RACE. 

Apostle Kelley asserts : "Further, it is known that the 
oldest nation that inhabited America has long since been 
exterminated. So says the 'Book of Mormon.' So says 
tradition. So says modern research." — Presidency and 
Priesthood, p. 264. 

But we are compelled to dissent from this opinion of 
Apostle Kelley. That the Book of Mormon says that 
the oldest nation which inhabited America has long since 
been exterminated we allow, but when it comes to tradi- 
tion and modern research we are not prepared to con- 
cede that they agree with the Book of Mormon. It can 
be shown that tribes and nations have been broken up 
by war, famine and pestilence ; that they have been scat- 
tered in different directions and merged with other tribes 
and nations, and that they have lost their former glory ; 
but it can not be proved that an ancient and widespread 
race, like the Jaredite, ever lost its existence in the way 
in which the Book of Mormon declares this people lost 
theirs. 

Everywhere throughout the New World the evidences 
proclaim loudly and emphatically against the theory of 
"vanished," "lost" and "extinct" races, using these terms 
in the sense in which they are applied to the Book of 
Mormon peoples. The Mound Builders, about whom so 
much mystery hung for a number of years, are now 
positively proved to have been only tribes of American 
Indians, and so critically have their remains been studied 
that in many instances the very tribes who built the 
works of certain localities are known. The same is also 
true of the Cliff Dwellers. While, according to Brinton, 
the people who erected Copan and Quirigua, said by the 



240 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Josephite Committee on American Archaeology to be 
Jaredite cities, are represented to-day by no less than 
nineteen distinct tribes, as follows : Aguatecas, Cakchi- 
quels, Chaneabals, Chinantecos, Choles, Chords, Huas- 
tecas, Ixils, Lacandons, Mams, Mayas, Mopans, Quek- 
chis, Quiches, Pokomams, Pokonchis, Tzendals, Tzutu- 
hils and Uspantecas. 1 

That Mormon writers identify the Jaredite cities with 
those of the Mayas in Yucatan, Honduras, etc., is made 
evident by a statement in "Book of Mormon Lectures," 
p. 64. Mr. Stebbins says in this place : "The chief Jared- 
ite cities were not in Mexico, but south in Yucatan, Hon- 
duras, etc." If this is true, Uxmal, Chichen Itza, Peten, 
Palenque, Quirigua, Copan and Utatlan are all the work 
of an exterminated race who met their final defeat in a 
battle in western New York six centuries before Christ. 
This, I do not hesitate to say, is putting the overthrow 
of their builders before the erection of the cities them- 
selves, for but very few, if any, of our best-informed 
writers of to-day would feel justified in giving any of 
them an antiquity of more than nineteen hundred 
years. 

The theory that the cities mentioned were erected by 
an exterminated race is not advanced, so far as I can 
learn, by any author of any prominence whatever who 
has written within the last quarter of a century, although 
at the time the Book of Mormon came out some of the 
more ignorant and visionary believed it. It belongs to 
that class of theories broached and defended by such 
fanatics as George Jones, Lord Kingsborough and Jo- 
siah Priest. 

Bancroft says on the relationship of the ancient Cen- 



1 "The American Race," p. 158. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



241 



tral Americans to those of the present day: "I deem the 
ground sufficient, therefore, for accepting this Central 
American civilization of the past as a fact, referring it 
not to an extinct ancient race, but to the direct ancestors 
of the peoples still occupying the country with the 
Spaniards, and applying to it the name Maya as that of 
the language which has claims as strong as any to be 
considered the mother tongue of the linguistic family 
mentioned." — Native Races, Vol. II., p. 117. 

Squier also attributes the cities of Central America 
to the ancestors of the present native population. "All 
of them were the work of the same people, or of nations 
of the same race, dating from a high antiquity, and in 
blood and language precisely the same race, . . . that was 
found in occupation of the country by the Spaniards, and 
who still constitute the great bulk of the population." — 
Palacio, Carta, pp. 9, 10. 

Tylor, the eminent anthropologist, writes : "The 
sculptures and temples of Central America are the work 
of the ancestors of the present Indians." — Tylor s Re- 
searches, p. 189. 

Brinton says on the identity of the builders of Pa- 
lenque and Copan with the present-existing tribes : "At 
the time of the conquest the stately structures of Copan, 
Palenque, T'Ho and many other cities were deserted and 
covered with an apparently primitive forest ; but others 
not inferior to them, Uxmal, Chichen Itza, Peten, etc., 
were the centers of dense population, proving that the 
builders of both were identical." — The American Race, 
P- 155- 

And Short says of the builders of Palenque : "Under 
the shadow of the magnificent and mysterious ruins of 
Palenque a people grew to power who spread into Guate- 
mala and Honduras, northward toward Anahuac and 



242 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



southward into Yucatan, and for a period of probably 
twenty-five centuries" — from 955 B. C. to the Spanish 
Conquest — "exercised a sway which at one time excited 
the envy and fear of its neighbors." — North Americans 
of Antiquity, p. 203. 

The conclusion of these authors is founded upon 
the most conclusive evidence. Palenque, Copan and 
THo were uninhabited at the time of the Conquest, not 
because their builders had been exterminated in a fatal 
conflict in western New York, but because they had been 
broken up into fragmentary nations and had been scat- 
tered to different parts of the central region. 

Yucatan is identified by the Committee with the 
Jaredite land of Nehor. And, as it is not identified with 
any Nephite country, we infer that with them its ruined 
cities were all the work of that extinct race. But this is 
not true. The cities of Yucatan were among the later 
works of the Maya people, and were not built by an 
extinct race. Uxmal, according to Thomas, was built by 
the Tutul Xiu, a royal family, probably not much earlier 
than the beginning of the twelfth century, and was in- 
habited at the time of the Conquest. And Chichen Itza 
was probably founded in the sixth century A. D., and 
was also inhabited when the Spaniards first visited it. 
While, as for Mayapan, one account says that it was one 
of the tributary capitals of Xibalba, while another de- 
clares that it was built by Kukulkan after leaving 
Chichen Itza. But, be the dates of the founding of these 
cities what they may, one thing is certain : they were 
founded by the ancestors of the present native popula- 
tion and not by an extinct race. "It may then be ac- 
cepted," writes Bancroft, "as a fact susceptible of no 
doubt that the Yucatan structures were built by the 
Mayas, the direct ancestors of the people found in the 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



243 



peninsula at the Conquest and of the present native popu- 
lation." — Native Races, Vol. IV., p. 283. 

I challenge the Committee on American Archaeology 
to prove by trustworthy and well-authenticated evidence 
that the first civilized people of Central America, those 
who built Copan and Quirigua, were exterminated in 
the sense in which the Jaredites are said to have been 
exterminated. 

THE EMPIRES OF THE MAYAS AND NAHUAS WERE CON- 
FINED TO CENTRAL AMERICA AND MEXICO. 

We are informed that the empire of the Jaredites 
extended from Honduras on the south to the Great Lakes 
on the north, and east and west from ocean to ocean. 
The Nephites included within their domain not only all 
of this territory, but also in addition that part of South 
America now known as the United States of Colombia, 
and, in earlier times, also Peru. Throughout their respec- 
tive empires these peoples, during their respective epochs, 
were of a uniform degree of civilization, practiced the 
same arts, possessed the same customs, worshiped the 
same God, were under the same laws, spoke the same 
language, and erected the same kinds of buildings. 

Ether says of the Jaredites: "And the whole face of 
the land northward was covered with inhabitants ; and 
they were exceeding industrious, and they did buy and 
sell, and traffic one with another, that they might get 
gain. And they did work in all manner of ore, and they 
did make gold, and silver, and iron, and brass, and all 
manner of metals; and they did dig it out of the earth; 
wherefore they did cast up mighty heaps of earth to get 
ore of gold, and of silver, and of iron, and of copper. 
And they did work all manner of fine work. And they 
did have silks, and fine twined linen; and they did work 



244 



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all manner of cloth, that they might clothe themselves 
from their nakedness. And they did make all manner of 
tools to till the earth, both to plow and to sow, to reap 
and to hoe. and also to thrash. And they did make all 
manner of tools with which they did work their beasts. 
And they did make all manner of weapons of war. And 
they did work all manner of work of exceeding curious 
workmanship. And never could be a people more blest 
than were they, and more prospered by the hand of the 
Lord." — Ether 4 : 7. 

The "land northward/" on the Committee's maps, is 
the name of that country lying south of the Great Lakes 
and north of Mexico, the "land of Heth." Evidently, in 
its broader sense, it included not only this territory, but 
also Mexico and a part at least of Central America. 
L T pon the "whole face" of this land the inhabitants were 
engaged in the same occupations and practiced the same 
arts, implying a uniform degree of culture from Central 
America northward to what is now the boundary-line 
between Canada and the United States. 

The following is a description given of the Xephites 
at the period of their widest extent: "Now, the land 
south" — South America — "was called Lehi. and the land 
north" — North .America — "was called Mulek, which was 
after the sons of Zedekiah ; for the Lord did bring Mulek 
into the land north, and Lehi into the land south. And 
behold, there was all manner of gold in both these lands, 
and of silver, and of precious ore of every kind; and 
there were also curious workmen, who did work all kinds 
of ore, and did refine it : and thus they did become rich. 
They did raise grain in abundance, both in the north and 
in the south. And they did flourish exceedingly, both in 
the north and in the south. And they did multiply and 
wax exceeding strong in the land. And they did raise 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



245 



many flocks and herds, yea, many fatlings. Behold, their 
women did toil and spin, and did make all manner of 
cloth, of fine twined linen, and cloth of every kind, to 
clothe their nakedness." — Helaman 2 : 27. 

But, when we carefully examine the evidences, tradi- 
tional, linguistic and archaeological, we find no proof of 
the former existence of these lost empires. The Mayan 
Empire, with which the Jaredite must be identified if 
with any, had its center in the Usumacinta Valley, and in 
its widest extent only comprised the territory of the 
present states of Chiapas, Tabasco, Yucatan, Guatemala 
and a part of Honduras. At the time of the Conquest 
its descendants were confined to this territory, with the 
exception of an outlying colony, the Huastecs, in the 
valley of the Rio Panuco, which undoubtedly was left 
behind in the original migration from the north. The 
capitals of this empire, according to tradition, were 
Palenque in Chiapas, Copan in Honduras and Mayapan 
in Yucatan. 

The empire of the Toltecs occupied central and 
southern Mexico. At the period of its greatest power 
it comprised only the confederated states of Culhuacan, 
Otompan and Tollan. 

This is all that can be said for the extent of the two 
most advanced and prosperous empires of antiquity in 
that part of the New World. To move the boundary- 
line of the first northward as far as the Great Lakes, 
and the boundary-lines of the second northward to the 
Great Lakes, and southward at least to Ecuador, is to go 
directly contrary to all traditional, linguistic and archae- 
ological indications. 

There are no proofs by which to establish a national 
connection between the ancient inhabitants of the Mis- 
sissippi Valley and those of Central America. The. 



246 



CUM O RAH REVISITED 



peoples of the two sections were wholly different in 
their culture stata. Their structures were dissimilar, 
except that they were built upon pyramidal bases. The 
Mound Builders used no cut stone or mortar; they had 
no hieroglyphical writing; their sculpture work was con- 
fined to the carving of shells, bones and small pieces of 
stone; their structures were all of wood or other perish- 
able materials ; they worked the metals in a cold state 
and knew nothing of the arts of smelting and alloying; 
and they depended, in a great measure, upon the chase 
for food. On the other hand, the Mexicans and Central 
Americans built large and imposing palaces and temples 
of cut stone, laid in well-tempered mortar; they reached 
a high degree of proficiency in hieroglyphical writing; 
they were good sculptors and covered their buildings 
with ornamental and graphic designs ; they had well- 
organized governments ; and they were experts in the 
arts of alloying and smelting metals. 

Yet, notwithstanding these well-marked differences, 
Mr. Stebbins asserts : "Science fully establishes that a 
great nation formerly lived in the United States, and all 
unite in saying that the evidences are that this wonderful 
civilization had its base and origin in Central America 
and Mexico, and that from those countries it spread over 
the United States." — Lectures, p. 57. 

But it is hard to understand how a civilized people 
from Central America, practicing advanced arts and 
under the government of the mother country, moving 
up into the Mississippi Valley, should suddenly relapse 
into a state of savagery and give up the arts of cutting, 
polishing and carving stone and the use of mortar; the 
smelting and alloying of metals, and the art of hiero- 
glyphical writing. And yet this is just what occurred, if 
the ancient inhabitants of the Mississippi Valley came 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



247 



from. Mexico and Central America. Mr. Stebbins' claim 
that a "wonderful civilization" once existed in the United 
States is wholly incorrect. The Mound Builders were 
not one whit ahead of the Chata Muskokis, Cherokees 
and Iroquois when these tribes were first seen by the 
whites. On this point Professor Thomas speaks as 
follows : "Nothing trustworthy has been discovered to 
justify the theory that the mound builders belonged to 
a highly civilized race, or that they were a people who 
had attained a higher culture status than the Indians." — 
Mound Exploration, p. 11. 

Again, Mr. Stebbins' assertion that "all unite in say- 
ing that this wonderful civilization had its base and 
origin in Central America and Mexico" is also without 
foundation, for the great body of archaeologists to-day 
deny that the arts of the Mississippi Valley were derived 
from the South. "There is, it is now reasonably certain," 
says Nadaillac, "no good ground for connecting the 
builders of the earthworks of the Mississippi Valley with 
the Central American people who erected the remarkable 
monuments which will hereafter be referred to. But, 
until very recently, it has been a favorite and not unnat- 
ural hypothesis which served to temporarily appease an 
ignorance, pardonable in itself, but now no longer neces- 
sary." — Prehistoric America, p. 13. 

There is but one similarity that might indicate a con- 
nection between the peoples of the two sections — they 
both erected pyramidal mounds upon which they built 
their edifices. But here the analogy ends, for those north 
of Mexico are minus the ricniy-sculptured and richly-or- 
namented temples which crown the summits of those in 
Central America. This leads us to conclude that, while 
the art gems of each people undoubtedly came from a 
common source, they must have diverged at a time when 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



the two were in a savage state, before the invention of 
sculpturing, hieroglyphical writing and other arts for 
which the Mayas were justly famous and which were not 
practiced by the Mound Builders. 

On this point Thomas remarks : "It is true that trun- 
cated pyramidal mounds of large size and somewhat 
regular proportions are found in certain sections, and 
that some of these have ramps or roadways leading up 
to them. Yet when compared with the pyramids or 
teocalli of Mexico and Yucatan the differences in the 
manifestations of architectural skill are so great, and the 
resemblances are so faint and few, as to furnish no 
grounds whatever for attributing the two classes of 
works to the same people. The facts that the works of 
the one people consist chiefly of wrought and sculptured 
stone, and that such materials are wholly unknown to 
the other, forbid the idea of any relationship between the 
two. The difference between the two classes of monu- 
ments indicates a wide divergence — a complete step — in 
the culture status." — The Problem of the Ohio Mounds, 
p. 14. 

There is, likewise, no evidence of a national connec- 
tion between the ancient peoples of South America and 
those of Central America and Mexico. At the Discovery 
the Peruvians were wholly unlike the Mayas and Nahuas 
in religion, government, language, architecture and sculp- 
turing, and their remains indicate that these differences 
had existed from the time the two peoples began to walk 
in the pathway of civilization. 

The theory of the Book of Mormon is that the people 
who built the most ancient cities of Peru were those of 
the second epoch of civilization in Central America and 
Mexico. But this theory is untenable, for the reason 
that the Peruvians and Central Americans had no con- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



249 



nection after they began the erection of those cities 
attributed by the Mormons to Jaredite and Nephite 
workmanship. In other words, the separation of the two 
peoples dates back to a period preceding any to which 
we are carried by the archaeological evidences. So far 
as the evidence goes, the civilizations of the two sections 
were indigenous and were developed wholly independent 
of each other. 

Says Baldwin : "It may be that all the old American 
civilizations had a common origin in South America, and 
that all the ancient Americans whose civilization can be 
traced in remains found north of the Isthmus came origi- 
nally from that part of the continent. This hypothesis 
appears to me more probable than any other I have heard 
suggested. But, assuming this to be true, the first migra- 
tion of civilized people from South America must have 
taken place at a very distant period in the past, for it 
preceded not only the history indicated by the existing 
antiquities, but also an earlier history, during which the 
Peruvians and Central Americans grew to be as different 
from their ancestors as from each other. In each case 
the development of civilization represented by existing 
monuments, so far as we can study it, appears to have 
been original." — Ancient America, p. 246. 

The "existing antiquities" of Peru are, many of them, 
identified by the Committee with the works of the Ne- 
phites. The ancient city of Cuzco is identified with the 
Book of Mormon city of Nephi ; Huanuco, with Ishmael ; 
Gran Chimu, or Trujillo, with Middoni ; Riobamba, with 
Amulon, and Cuelap-Tingo, with Lehi-Nephi. But, if 
Baldwin is correct, these cities were built after, not 
before, the separation of the peoples of Peru and Central 
America. 

Bancroft sustains Baldwin: "The Maya and Peruvian 



250 



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peoples may have been one in remote antiquity ; if so, the 
separation took place at a period long preceding any to 
which we are carried by the material relics of the 
Votanic empire" — those said to have been erected by the 
Jaredites — "and of the most ancient epoch of the south- 
ern civilization, or even by traditional annals and the 
vaguest myths." — Native Races, Vol. IV., p. 806. 

This is putting the separation of the two peoples back 
of the erection of those monuments which are attributed 
to the Jaredites, making it wholly impossible for a people 
from Peru to have built any of the cities of Central 
America, or to have been under the same government 
with their builders. 

The facts, therefore, seem to show that the two 
civilized nations of Central America and Mexico were 
confined, in their civilizations and governments, to the 
central region, and to the central region alone, and that 
they had no control over any people or territory south 
of the Isthmus of Panama or north of the northern 
boundary-line of Mexico. Therefore they could not 
have been the Jaredites and Nephites. 

THE TRADITIONAL HISTORY OF THE T0LTECS PRESENTS NO 
FEATURES SIMILAR TO THE HISTORY OF THE 
NEPHITES. 

Elder Stebbins thinks that the Toltecs were the 
Nephites. He says : "I believe that the people spoken 
of in tradition and in history as the Toltecs are those 
named Nephites in the Book of Mormon." — Lectures, 
p. 230. 

If this is true, we may expect to find in their tradi- 
tions proofs by which this identification may be con- 
firmed. But, unfortunately for Elder Stebbins, there is 
nothing in the traditions to substantiate his theory, as 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



251 



will be seen in the following brief historical account. 

It appears that the first movement of the Nahuas into 
Central America occurred after the Mayas had become 
fully settled in the Usumacinta Valley. At the time of 
their immigration the Mayas were in the height of their 
glory, their government comprising within its jurisdic- 
tion the states of Chiapas, Tabasco, Yucatan, Guatemala 
and western Honduras. There are reasons for believing 
that the Nahuas founded their capital at Tulan in Chi- 
apas, and that, after living peaceably side by side with 
the Xibalbans for a number of years, they finally devel- 
oped sufficient strength to overthrow their old, effete 
empire. Following the fall of Xibalba the Nahua power 
continued to increase until about the fifth century, when 
it ended "in revolt, disaster and a general scattering of 
the tribes." With the sixth and seventh centuries Toltec 
supremacy was achieved in Mexico. It is probable that, 
with the scattering of the Nahua people, many of them 
moved northward into that country and passed under the 
dominion of the Toltecs, who may have been originally 
but a small tribe or a ruling family. The Toltec con- 
federacy was composed of three small kingdoms named 
from capital cities, Culhuacan, Otompan and Tollan, each 
of which had its turn as the ruling power. Culhuacan 
and Otompan corresponded very nearly with the Aztec 
states, Mexico and Tezcuco ; Tollan joined them on the 
northwest. The date of the Toltec departure from Hue 
Hue Tlapallan is given differently by different writers. 
Ixtlilxochitl gives two dates, 338 and 439; Veytia gives 
596 ; Clavigero, 544 or 596, and Muller, 439. It is wholly 
impossible to determine the date positively, but 544 A. D. 
is the one adopted by most of the later writers as being 
the nearest correct. 

The story of the departure of the Toltecs and their 



252 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



subsequent settlement in Mexico is, briefly, as follows. 
Chalcatzin and Tlacamihtzin, two chiefs of royal blood, 
undertook to depose the king of Hue Hue Tlapallan, 
with the result that they and their followers were driven 
out of their kingdom and were forced to flee for their 
lives. This was the beginning of the Toltec migration 
from the north, which lasted, according to Ixtlilxochitl, 
104 years. Their first capital in the land of Mexico was 
Tollantzinco, where they dwelt eight years, until their 
removal to Tollan, where the Toltec empire proper was 
founded. Seven years after their establishment at Tollan 
the chiefs, seven in number, came together to effect a 
permanent union between their bands, and, by the advice 
of their prophet, Hueman, sent an embassy with presents 
to the court of the Chichimec king, Icauhtzin, who gave 
them his second son, Chalchiuh Tlatonac, to be their first 
sovereign. This young man was renowned for his fine 
personal appearance, wisdom and goodly character, and 
for the excellent service he rendered his people. Soon 
after ascending the throne the young king decided to 
take a wife, and chose as his queen the beautiful daugh- 
ter of Acapichtzin, one of the Toltec chiefs. The history 
of the Toltecs from this on is very confused, and to 
obtain a correct list of their kings is impossible owing to 
this confusion and to the custom which they had of giv- 
ing a number of names to the same ruler according to 
his power and prominence. Suffice it to say that for five 
centuries the Toltec government exercised the strongest 
influence in Mexico of any. Its cities were renowned 
for their splendor, its kings for their power, its armies 
for their valor, its people for their progress and skill, 
and its religion for its bloodlessness, human sacrifices 
being abandoned under the reign of one Quetzalcoatl. 
But, finally, the empire weakened under the repeated 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



253 



attacks of the Chichimecs, and the last Toltec king, 
Topiltzin, was forced to flee, following which the coun- 
try passed under Chichimec rule. 1 

There has been much written concerning the Toltecs 
which undoubtedly is pure fiction, but that a people bear- 
ing that name did exist and did build some of the works 
attributed to them is accepted as established by most 
authors. The points derived from these traditions, that 
may be accepted as in a true sense historical, are ( 1 ) the 
general tendency of Nahuatl migrations from north to 
south; (2) the founding of the Toltec kingdom in the 
sixth or seventh century and its continuance for a few 
hundred years; (3) the confinement of its government 
to central and southern Mexico; and (4) the prosperity 
of its capital cities, Culhuacan, Otompan and Tollan. 

Let the reader compare this brief outline of Toltec 
history with that of the Nephites, and he will find no 
agreement at all by which to confirm the belief of Mr. 
Stebbins that the Toltecs and Nephites were one and the 
same people. 

Not only are the traditions devoid of any historical 
similarity to the account of the Nephites, but there is 
also no resemblance between the names of men and of 
places given in these traditions and those given in the 
Book of Mormon. 

TOLTEC CHARACTERS. NEPHITE CHARACTERS. 

Chalcatzin. Nephi. 

Tlacamihtzin. Ammon. 

Hueman. Helaman. 

Chalchiuh Tlatonac. Alma. 

Totepeuh. Amaron. 

Huetzin. Amulek. 



1 "Native Races," Vol. V., Chapter IV. 



254 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Quetzalcoatl. 
Topiltzin. 



Hagoth. 

Mosiah. 

Gideon. 

Mormon, 

Moroni. 



Lachoneus. 



Mitl. 



Papantzin. 
Chicon Tonatiuh. 
Nauhyotl. 



TOLTEC CITIES AND PLACES. NEPHITE CITIES AND PLACES. 



In this chapter seven arguments have been presented 
against the claim that the ancient inhabitants of Central 
America and Mexico were the Jaredites and Nephites. 
They are, briefly : ( I ) The ancient inhabitants of those 
regions, judging from various evidences, were of the 
present race. (2) The first people of Central America 
were savages instead of civilized men, as the Book of 
Mormon declares. (3) The ancient peoples came from 
the north instead of from the east or south, as the 
Jaredites and Nephites are said to have come. (4) These 
ancient peoples were here at the same time and not con- 
secutively, as the Jaredites and Nephites are said to have 
been. (5) The oldest civilized people of Central Amer- 
ica, those who built Palenque, Copan and Quirigua, are 
not an extinct race in the sense in which the Jaredites are 
said to be extinct. (6) The aboriginal governments of 



Culhuacan. 
Otompan. 



Teancum. 



Angola. 
Boaz. 



Tollan. 

Tollantzinco. 

Cholula. 

Teotihuacan. 

Quauhtitlan. 

Jalisco. 

Tultitlan. 

Xico. 



David. 

Joshua. 

Shem. 

Jordan. 

Shim. 

Mulek. 



Desolation 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



255 



these peoples were confined to Central America and 
Mexico and had no control over tribes north of Mexico 
or south of the Isthmus. And (7) the traditional history 
of the Toltecs presents no points of agreement, in either 
names or details, or even in general outline, with the his- 
tory of the Nephites as given in the Book of Mormon. 
I think from these considerations that the identification 
made by Mormon writers of the "two distinct peoples" 
of Bancroft and Short with the Jaredites and Nephites 
may be safely dismissed as fanciful and erroneous. 1 

1 In this chapter and elsewhere in this book, I have followed DeBour- 
bourg and have employed the terms "Colhuas" and "Xibalba" as names 
for the ancient Central American people and their empire. I have so 
employed these terms, fully aware that such an application of them is 
objected to by many learned scholars, in the absence of better designations. 
"Colhua" is the Nahua term for "ancestors," while "Xibalba" is the 
Quiche name for the underworld and literally means "the place of dis- 
appearance." 



256 



C CM OR All REVISITED 



CHAPTER VI. 

Were the Mound Builders the Jaredites and Nephites? — History 
of the Discussion of the Nationality of the Mound Builders 
— The Theory of the Mormons on the Nationality of the 
Mound Builders — The Mound Builders One People, Not Two 
— The Mound Builders Not One Nation, but Many Tribes — 
The Direction of Mound Builder Migration — The Antiquity 
of the Mounds — The Culture of the Mound Builders — The 
Mound Builders Neither Jaredites nor Nephites, but La- 
manites. 

The name "Mound Builders" is applied to the ancient 
people who built the mounds and earthen fortifications 
of the United States. It is confessed on all sides that 
it is only a convenient term, and that it is used in 
want of a better designation. No question in American 
archaeology has provoked more discussion than has the 
question of the nationality of this people. For a long 
time the majority of archaeologists believed them to be a 
vanished race of high culture, distinct from the Indian 
tribes who inhabited the mound region at the coming of 
the whites. But this theory, during the last quarter of a 
century, has been fully refuted, and the opposite theory, 
that they were only tribes of American Indians, has been 
established. 

On the history of the discussion of the nationality of 
the Mound Builders, Professor Thomas writes: 

"About the commencement of the nineteenth century 
two new and important characters appear on the stage 
of American archaeology. These are Bishop Madison, 
of Virginia, and Rev. Thaddeus M. Harris, of Massa- 
chusetts. 'These two gentlemen,' as remarked by Dr. 
Haven, . . . 'are among the first who, uniting oppor- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



257 



tunities of personal observation to the advantages of 
scientific culture, imparted to the public their impressions 
of Western antiquities. They represent the two classes 
of observers whose opposite views still divide the senti- 
ment of the country; one class seeing no evidence of art 
beyond what might be expected of existing tribes, with 
the simple difference of a more numerous population and 
consequently better denned and more permanent habita- 
tions ; the other finding proofs of skill and refinement, to 
be explained, as they believe, only on the supposition 
that a superior native race, or more probably a people 
of foreign and higher civilization, once occupied the 
soil.' 

"Bishop Madison was the representative of the first 
class. Dr. Harris represented that section of the second 
class maintaining the opinion that the mound builders 
were Toltecs, who, after residing for a time in this 
region, moved south into Mexico. 

"As the principal theories which are held at the pres- 
ent day on this subject are substantially set forth in these 
authorities, it is unnecessary to follow up the history of 
the controversy except so far as is required in order to 
notice the various modifications of the two leading views. 

"Those holding the opinion that the Indians were not 
the authors of these works, although agreeing on this 
point, and hence included in one class, differ widely 
among themselves as to the people to whom they are to 
be ascribed; one section, of which Dr. Harris may be 
considered the pioneer, holding that they were built by 
the Toltecs, who occupied the Mississippi Valley previ- 
ous to their appearance in the vale of Anahuac. 

"Among the more recent advocates of this view may 
be classed the following authors : Messrs. Squier and 
Davis, in their 'Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi. 



258 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



Valley (though Mr. Squier subsequently changed his 
opinion so far as it related to the antiquities of New 
York, which he became convinced should be attributed 
to the Iroquois tribes) ; Mr. John T. Short, in his 'North 
Americans of Antiquity;' Dr. Dawson, in his 'Fossil 
Man,' who identifies the Tallegwi with the Toltecs ; Rev. 
J. P. McLean, in his 'Mound Builders,' and Dr. Joseph 
Jones, in his 'Antiquities of Tennessee.' 

"Wilson, in his 'Prehistoric Man,' modifies this view 
somewhat, looking to the region south of Mexico for the 
original home of the Toltecs and deriving the Aztecs 
from the mound builders. 

"Another section of this class includes those who, 
although rejecting the idea of an Indian origin, are 
satisfied with simply designating the authors of these 
works a 'lost race,' without following the inquiry into 
the more uncertain field of racial or ethnical relations. 
To this type belong most of the authors of recent short 
articles and brief reports on American archaeology, and 
quite a number of diligent workers in this field whose 
names are not before the world as authors. 

"J. D. Baldwin, in his 'Ancient America,' expresses 
the belief that the mound builders were Toltecs, but 
thinks they came originally from Mexico, or farther 
south, and after occupying the Ohio Valley and the Gulf 
States, probably for centuries, were at last driven south- 
ward by an influx of barbarous hordes from the northern 
region and appeared again in Mexico. Bradford, thirty 
years previous to this, had suggested Mexico as the;r 
original home. Lewis H. Morgan, on the other hand, 
supposes that the authors of these remains came from 
the Pueblo tribes of New Mexico. Dr. Foster agrees 
substantially with Baldwin. In this general class may 
also be included a number of extravagant hypotheses, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



259 



such as those advanced by Rafmesque, George Jones, 
Delafield and others. 

"The class maintaining the view that the monuments 
are the work of Indians found inhabiting the country at 
the time of its discovery or their ancestors, numbered, up 
to a recent date, but comparatively few leading author- 
ities among its advocates ; in other words, the followers 
of Bishop Madison are, or at least were until recently, 
far less numerous than the followers of Dr. Harris. The 
differences between the advocates of this view are of 
minor importance and only appear when the investiga- 
tion is carried one step further back, and the attempt 
made to designate the particular tribe, nation, people or 
ethnic family to which they pertained. 

"The tradition of the Delawares, as given by Hecke- 
welder, having brought upon the stage the Tallegwi, they 
are made to play a most important part in the specula- 
tions of those inclined to the theory of an Indian origin. 
And, as this tradition agrees very well with a number of 
facts brought to light by antiquarian and philological 
researches, it has had considerable influence in shaping 
the conclusion even of those who are not professed be- 
lievers in it. 

"One of the ablest early advocates of the Indian 
origin of these works was Dr. McCulloh ; and his con- 
clusions, based, as they were, on comparatively slender 
data then obtainable, are remarkable, not only for the 
clearness with which they are stated and the distinctness 
with which they are defined, but as being more in accord- 
ance with all the facts ascertained than perhaps those of 
any contemporary. 

"Samuel G. Drake, Henry Schoolcraft, Dr. Haven 
and Sir John Lubbock are also disposed to ascribe these 
ancient works to the Indians. Among the recent advo- 



260 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



cates of this theory are the following, who have made 
known their position in regard to the question by their 
writings or addresses. 

"Judge C. C. Baldwin, in a paper read before the 
State Archaeological Society of Ohio, expresses the belief 
that the mound builders of Ohio were village Indians. 
Col. F. M. Force expresses a similar opinion in his paper 
entitled 'The Mound Builders,' read before the Cincin- 
nati Literary Club. Dr. D. G. Brinton brings forward, 
in an article published in the October number, 1881, of 
the American Antiquarian, considerable historical evi- 
dence tending to the conclusion that the Indians were the 
authors of these ancient works. Dr. P. R. Hoy, in a 
paper entitled 'Who Built the Mounds?' published in the 
'Transactions of the Wisconsin Academy of Science,' 
brings forward a number of facts to sustain the same 
view. Mr. Lucien Carr, of Cambridge, Mass., in a paper 
entitled 'The Mounds of the Mississippi Valley, Histori- 
cally Considered' (contained in the 'Memoirs of the Ken- 
tucky Geological Survey'), has presented a very strong 
array of historical evidence, going to show not only that 
the Indians east of the Mississippi, at the time they were 
first discovered by Europeans, were sedentary and agri- 
cultural, but also that several of the tribes were in the 
habit of building mounds. Several articles and two small 
volumes have also been published by the author of this 
volume, taking the same view. The articles will be found 
in the American Antiquarian, Magazine of American 
History, Science, American Anthropologist, and else- 
where. The two small works are 'The Cherokees in 
Pre-Columbian Times' and 'The Shawnees in Pre-Colum- 
bian Times.' 

"These recent papers may justly be considered the 
commencement of a rediscussion of this question, in 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



which the Indian, after a long exclusion, will be read- 
mitted as a possible factor in the problem. Professor 
Dall has likewise taken an advanced step in this direction 
in the excellent American edition of Marquis de Nadail- 
lac's 'Prehistoric America,' holding accepting the results 
of later investigations; and the same is true in regard to 
Prof. N. S. Shaler's 'Kentucky.' " — Twelfth Annual Re- 
port of the Bureau of American Ethnology, pp. 598-600. 

Since this was written, eighteen years ago, the theory 
that the American Indians were the builders of these 
works has grown rapidly in favor, while the opposite 
theory has been gradually losing ground. From the dis- 
coveries that have been made it would seem utterly im- 
possible to draw any line between the people who built 
the mounds and those who inhabited the mound region 
at the time of its settlement by Europeans. Historical, 
traditional and archaeological evidences all tend to sus- 
tain the view that they were one and the same people and 
in about the same conditions of life. 

THE THEORY OF THE MORMONS ON THE NATIONALITY OF 
THE MOUND BUILDERS. 

A number of Mormon writers declare that the people 
known to us as the Mound Builders were the Jaredites 
of the Book of Mormon. This is the opinion of Apostle 
Kelley, who says : "This history" — Book of Mormon — 
"is in harmony with the Indian tradition ; that is, a 
'uniform statement' among them everywhere that the 
mound builders preceded their nation in settling in 
America. The mound builders were here centuries — 
twelve centuries — before the progenitors of the Indians 
came, according to the Book of Mormon." — Presidency 
and Priesthood, p. 263. 

Elder Stebbins quotes the following from Baldwin; 



262 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



"Who were the Mound Builders? They were unques- 
tionably American aborigines, and not immigrants from 
another continent." And then adds: "Now they judge 
this from the fact that their constructions, their mode of 
burial, and other peculiarities, mark them as having been 
a separate and distinct people from any other that at any 
time inhabited America. And we, knowing that they 
came from the Tower of Babel, can understand why they 
were neither Hebrews nor like any other people in any 
land." — Lectures, p. 85. 

The people who, according to the Book of Mormon, 
were here before the ancestors of the Indians came, and 
who came from the Tower of Babel, and who were not 
Hebrews, were the Jaredites. 

But all Latter-day Saints do not, evidently, agree that 
the Jaredites, exclusively, were the Mound Builders, and 
some seem disposed to give credit for some of the 
mounds built to the Nephites. The Committee on Amer- 
ican Archaeology, of which Apostle Kelley is himself a 
member, say : "On entering the United States, the Ne- 
phites settled largely in the same sections inhabited by 
the Jaredites, the oldest mound builders, and their 
march to their final conflict was along the same lines." — 
Report, p. 65. 

The superlative adjective "oldest" implies that there 
were Mound Builders more recent, and this opinion is 
more in harmony with the Book of Mormon, which 
seems to designate very plainly the territory of the 
United States as a part of both Jaredite and Nephite 
dominions. 

From the account that the Book of Mormon gives, it 
appears that the country north of Mexico was first set- 
tled by a company under a Jaredite king, Omer, who, 
through the "secret combinations" of one Akish, was 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



263 



deposed from his throne and was forced to flee from the 
land of Moron in Central America. His journey lay by 
the "hill of Shim," which the Committee locate in Chi- 
apas ; by the "place where the Nephites were destroyed," 
which is at Hill Cumorah, in Wayne County, New York, 
and ended at "Ablom, by the seashore," which the Com- 
mittee think was where Boston is now located. Omer 
was soon afterwards joined by Nimrah, a son of Akish, 
who was forced to flee from his native land because of 
having been angry with his father for having slain his 
brother. From this small nucleus, and from Central 
America, the Jaredites spread out until they covered "the 
whole face of the land northward." 

Ether gives this description of the Jaredites at the 
period of their greatest glory and widest extent: "And 
the whole face of the land northward was covered with 
inhabitants ; and they were exceeding industrious, and 
they did buy and sell, and traffic one with another, that 
they might get gain. And they did work in all manner 
of ore, and they did make gold, and silver, and iron, and 
brass, and all manner of metals ; and they did dig it out 
of the- earth; wherefore they did cast up mighty heaps of 
earth to get ore, of gold, and of silver, and of iron, and 
of copper. And they did work all manner of fine work. 
And they did have silks, and fine twined linen ; and they 
did work all manner of cloth, that they might clothe 
themselves from their nakedness. And they did make 
all manner of tools to till the earth, both to plough, and 
to sow, to reap and to hoe, and also to thresh. And they 
did make all manner of tools with which they did work 
their beasts. And they did make all manner of weapons 
of war. And they did work all manner of work of 
exceeding curious workmanship." — Ether 4: 7. 

On the spread of the Nephites throughout the land 



264 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



northward, Helaman says: "And it came to pass in the 
forty and sixth" — year of the judges, about 44 B. C. — 
"yea, there were much contentions and many dissensions ; 
in the which there were an exceeding great many who 
departed out of the land of Zarahemla" — United States 
of Colombia — "and went forth unto the land northward, 
to inherit the land; and they did travel to an exceeding 
great distance, insomuch that they came to large bodies 
of water" — Great Lakes — "and many rivers" — Missis- 
sippi, etc. — "yea, and even they did spread forth into all 
parts of the land, into whatever parts it had not been 
rendered desolate, and without timber, because of the 
many inhabitants" — Jaredites — "who had before inher- 
ited the land." — Helaman 2 :1. 

In the next paragraph he adds : "And it came to pass 
that they did multiply and spread, and did go forth from 
the land southward to the land northward, and did spread 
insomuch that they began to cover the face of the whole 
earth, from the sea south to the sea north, from the sea 
west to the sea east." 

The Committee identify these natural boundaries as 
follows: "The 'south sea' was the Gulf of Mexico, and 
the sea north, most likely, the lakes or Hudson's Bay; 
and the sea east, the Atlantic Ocean, and the sea west, 
the Pacific." — Report, p. 59. 

If these identifications are correct, the Nephites as 
well as the Jaredites occupied the territory of the present 
United States, and we may expect to find evidence show- 
ing that the ancient inhabitants of this territory differed 
both racially and culturally from the American Indians. 
But if, on the other hand, it should be shown that the 
builders of the mounds were in no way above the Ameri- 
can Indians in their culture status, and that they did not 
differ from them in race, the Book of Mormon is proved 



CUMORAH REVISITED 26$ 

a fraud and the ecclesiastical structures that are built 
upon it do not possess the authority they so loudly claim. 

THE CLAIM OF THE BOOK OF MORMON, THAT THE TERRI- 
TORY OF THE PRESENT UNITED STATES WAS INHABITED 
IN ANCIENT TIMES, DURING SUCCESSIVE EPOCHS, BY 
TWO DISTINCT PEOPLES, WITH TWO DISTINCT CIVILIZA- 
TIONS, MEETS WITH NO CONFIRMATION FROM AMERI- 
CAN ARCHAEOLOGY. 

It can not be proved that there were two separate 
epochs of mound-building- with a break of five or six 
hundred years between. On the contrary, the analogies 
between the mounds, the similarities that have been 
traced between the different works of art that have been 
found in them and the comparative conditions in which 
they have been discovered, prove conclusively that they 
were all built by one race, of similar habits and customs, 
though divided into various tribes, and not by two dis- 
tinct peoples of widely different races and during suc- 
cessive epochs. This is so clear that I know of no 
archaeologist who disputes it. 

"They were probably one people ; that is, composed 
of tribes living under similar laws, religion and other 
institutions." — Native Races, Vol. IV., p. 785. 

"There must have been separate, although cognate, 
nations." — Mound Builders, p. 140. 

"The analogy between the mounds is such that they 
can not but be the work of a people in about the same 
stage of culture." — Prehistoric America, p. 184. 

"They are all built by one people." — Footprints of 
Vanished Races, p. 39. 

"This renders it highly probable that there was no 
manifest break in the mound-building age. It may have 
continued, and probably did, for many centuries, but 



266 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



there is no satisfactory evidence found in the monuments 
that there were two distinct mound-building ages." — 
Cherokees in Pre-Columbian Times, p. 97. 

Other writers whose works I have examined, and 
who agree with the above as implied in what they have 
written, but who have not made statements concise 
enough to be quoted here, are Xott and Gliddon, Brad- 
ford, Fontaine, Donnelly, Foster, Short, Winchell, Sha- 
ler, Powell, Brinton, Moorehead, Carr and Dellenbaugh. 
To all these authors, no matter what their opinions on 
the nationality of the builders of the mounds are, the 
name Mound Builders stands for one people, a single 
race, and not for two peoples separated from each other 
by a period of five or six hundred years. 

IT IS POSITIVELY DENIED THAT THE MOUND BUILDERS, AS 
THE JAREDITES AND NEPHITES ARE SAID TO HAVE BEEN, 
WERE, AT ANY TIME IN THEIR HISTORY, ALL UNDER 
ONE GOVERNMENT EITHER INDEPENDENT OF OR SUB- 
JECT TO THE PEOPLE OF CENTRAL AMERICA. 

On the contrary, it is certain that they were divided 
up into a number of independent tribes who were often 
at war with one another, and who were evidently of 
different stocks, though belonging to the same great race 
and possessing about the same degree of culture. 

On this point Thomas writes : "One result of the 
more recent explorations and study of the ancient works 
of the mound region in the conviction that the mound 
builders were divided into numerous tribes, though be- 
longing substantially to the same culture state, which 
was of a lower grade than that attained by the people 
of Mexico and Central America, and apparently some- 
what less advanced than that of the Pueblo tribes of New 
Mexico and Arizona. However, there are no data to 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



267 



justify the belief that they pertained to different 'races/ 
using this term in its broad and legitimate sense." — 
Cherokees in Pre-Columbian Times, p. 65. 

And MacLean remarks : "There is one thing that 
impresses itself upon the mind of the investigator, viz. : 
that, owing to the manner in which they lived, the extent 
of territory occupied and the diversity of the works, 
there could not have been a central government, but 
there must have been separate, although cognate, na- 
tions." — Mound Builders, p. 140. 

The mound territory proper is to be divided into a 
number of sections, as, for instance, the New York sec- 
tion, the Ohio section, the Wisconsin section, etc. The 
remains in each of these States bear evidence of having 
been built by different tribes, possessing slightly different 
habits and customs and prompted by different motives, 
instead of by tribes under one central government. And 
many of these sections are to be resubdivided upon crani- 
ological and archaeological grounds. 

It- is now conceded, even by those who have con- 
tended that the Mound Builders are a vanished race, that 
the mounds and inclosures of New York were the work 
of the Iroquois tribes. And it must be admitted that 
some at least of the great structures of the Gulf States 
were erected by the Muskokis. Here, then, we have two 
sections of the mound region clearly established and 
separated from each other and the rest. 

The effigy-mound people of Wisconsin were evidently 
a different tribe, or were different tribes, from those who 
lived elsewhere in the country, and were most likely gov- 
erned by different social and religious ideas. And the 
same may be said for the stone-grave people of Ten- 
nessee. 

As for Ohio, Moorehead has very plainly shown that 



268 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



the State was formerly the home of two hostile and 
savage mound-building tribes, the "long-heads" of the 
valley of the Muskingum and the "short-heads" of the 
valleys of the Miami and the Scioto, and that these were 
almost constantly at war with each other. 1 

To claim that these tribes were only divisions of one 
great political body is absurd and foundationless. Each 
had its own petty government and practiced its own 
primitive habits and customs, which we shall see pres- 
ently were far below the standard given in the Book of 
Mormon. 

THE MOUND BUILDERS DID NOT COME FROM THE SOUTH, AS 
THE JAREDITES AND NEPHITES ARE SAID TO HAVE COME, 
BUT FROM THE NORTH OR THE NORTHWEST. 

I am aware that this is not only contradictory to the 
Book of Mormon and to the theory of its defenders, but 
that it is also contradictory to a number of those earlier 
opinions according to which the mounds were built by a 
people who were an offshoot of the Maya and Nahua 
nations, and whose culture was a well-developed product 
from the south. Nevertheless, the theory of a northern, 
or northwestern, derivation is more consistent with the 
data which we have at hand. Let us first consider the 
arguments that have been advanced to prove the south- 
ern origin of the Mound Builders. 

i. It was long believed that the Mound Builders must 
have come from the south, as it was thought a chain of 
aboriginal works could be traced from Mexico through 
Texas into the Mississippi Valley. Baldwin says of 
them : "This ancient race seems to have occupied nearly 
the whole basin of the Mississippi and its tributaries, 
with the fertile plains along the Gulf, and their settle- 

1 "Primitive Man in Ohio," pp. 197-199. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



269 



ments were continued across the Rio Grande into Mex- 
ico." — Ancient America, p. 32. 

But this claim is false, and can not stand in the light 
of recent investigations. Says Professor Thomas: "The 
statement frequently made by authors that the mound 
distribution continues through Texas is incorrect. " — 
American Archaeology, p. 60. This, then, breaks the 
supposed chain of connection between the Mississippi 
Valley and Mexico. 

2. It has also been asserted that pipes have been 
found in the mounds carved to represent a beast and birds 
that belong to a tropical climate, and this has been eager- 
ly pressed into the service of the theory of the southern 
origin of the Mound Builders. Squier and Davis, during 
their researches among the mounds of the Mississippi 
Valley in 1845-47, found forty-five of these pipes, seven 
of which they claimed were carvings of the manatee, 
three others of the toucan, while one they thought repre- 
sented the paraquet. Wilson, in his "Prehistoric Man," 
Vol. I., p. 475, declares that the close fidelity of these 
carvings to an aquatic animal and to birds of the south 
proves one of three things : either that the arts of the 
Mound Builders were derived from a foreign source ; or 
that they were in intimate communication with the civil- 
ized people of the south ; or else that there was a "migra- 
tion and an intrusion into the northern continent of the 
race of the ancient graves of central and southern Amer- 
ica, bringing with them the arts of the tropics and models 
derived from the animals familiar to their fathers in the 
parent land of the race." 

But this fanciful bubble has been bursted, and it is 
now known that these carvings are only rude imitations 
of beasts and birds familiar to the Indian tribes of the 
Mississippi Valley, and not models of those from the 



270 



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torrid zone. Mr. H. W. Henshaw, of the Smithsonian 

Institution, who has combined a knowledge of beasts and 
birds with his knowledge of relics, has ably refuted the 
identifications of Squier and Davis. He has shown that 
the objects said to be manatees have external ears, feet 
instead of flippers, while, in one instance, a supposed 
manatee has a fish in its mouth, notwithstanding that 
animal is "strictly herbivorous." He justly concludes, 
therefore, that the sculptor intended to represent an 
otter, an animal with which all the Indian tribes of the 
Mississippi Valley were well acquainted, and not a man- 
atee. Of the carvings said to represent the toucan, he 
concludes that one is "vaguely suggestive of a young 
eagle/' another of a crow, and the third of a wading 
bird of uncertain identification. The paraquet, he de- 
cides, is a member of the hawk family. This evidence, 
then, so long depended upon, has no force whatever in 
proving the southern origin of our Mound Builders. 
Mr. Henshaw concludes his examination by saying: 
"The state of art culture reached by the Mound Build- 
ers, as illustrated by their carvings, has been greatly 
overestimated." — Second Ann. Rcpt. Bit. Amer. Ethno., 
p. 166. 

3. But, perhaps, the architectural analogy, which has 
been traced between the temple mounds of the two re- 
gions, has been urged with greater persistency' than any 
other evidence as proof that the Mound Builders came 
from Central America. In both sections the people built 
truncated pyramids and employed them as bases for 
buildings. But here the analogy ends. Those at the 
south were foundations for magnificent and gorgeously 
decorated temples, while those at the north were em- 
ployed as bases for wooden structures which long ago 
disappeared. Xow, it is not reasonable to suppose that 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



271 



a people with highly developed arts, migrating from 
Central America into the Mississippi Valley, into a 
country of equal or superior advantages for the practice 
of their arts, and in constant intercourse with the mother 
country, should degenerate so far as to give up entirely 
the use of sculptured stone and mortar for wood and 
earth. And yet this must have been the case if the Book 
of Mormon is a true history of ancient America, for 
neither cut stone nor mortar were used by the Mound 
Builders. 

The bare fact that the ancient inhabitants of both 
sections erected pyramids with flattened summits does 
not prove that they were nationally related, although it 
may prove that the art germ of each came from the 
same source. If this architectural similarity proves 
migration in any direction, it does in the direction from 
north to south, and we may look upon the culture of 
Central America as being a development of that of the 
Mississippi Valley instead of the culture of the Missis- 
sippi Valley being a retrogression from that of Central 
America. In the New World, as well as in the Old, 
the trend was upward, not downward; forward, not 
backward. 

In contradiction to the theory that the Mound Build- 
ers came from the south, we have the traditional and 
historical evidences of their migration from the north 
or northwest. It can no longer be denied that the Iro- 
quois, Algonkins, Cherokees, Muskokis and Dakotas, as 
well as other tribes, were Mound Builders, and both 
tradition and history declare that their movements were 
in southerly and southeasterly directions. "So far as 
linguistic and traditional evidence can be traced," says 
Thomas, "it leads to the conclusion that the general 
movement, in prehistoric times, of the stocks in the 



272 



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United States was toward the south and the southeast." 
— American Archaeology, p. 157. 

The traditions of the Iroquois, as recorded by Col- 
den, Cusick, Morgan and Hale, tell us that this stock 
originally dwelt north of the Great Lakes, from which 
country they migrated southward into New York and 
adjacent States. Cartier, in 1535, found them on the 
St. Lawrence in territory which seventy years afterward 
was in possession of the Algonkin tribes. That they 
were Mound Builders is conceded by both Squier and 
Baldwin, who were leading advocates of the vanished- 
race theory. 

The Cherokees are a remote offshoot of the Iroquoian 
stock. This relationship was first suspected by Barton 
over a century ago ; advocated by Gallatin and Hale 
later, and positively established by Hewitt in 1887. With 
this claim their traditions agree, according to which they 
came from the north. Brinton declares that they 
"erected mounds as sites for their houses and for burial- 
places." 

The Algonkins, certain tribes of whom were Mound 
Builders, also came from the north. Gallatin, in his 
"Synopsis of the Indian Tribes," expresses the opinion 
that the Algonkins dwelling north of the Great Lakes 
are the original stock. Dr. Hale, from the name of their 
country, Shinaki, "land of fir-trees," decides that these 
tribes must have originally inhabited the woody region 
north of Lake Superior, while Dr. Brinton thinks that 
their early home must have been north of the St. Law- 
rence and east of Lake Ontario. 

Professor Thomas, whose opinion on this point is the 
same as that of Gallatin and Hale, after making a special 
study of the aboriginal migrations of this stock, con- 
cludes that the Lenapes crossed to the south side of the 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



273 



lakes in the region of Michilimackinac, after which they 
divided into three branches, the Shawnees going south, 
the Miamis settling in southern Michigan, and the rest, 
the Delawares, Nanticokes and other tribes, moving 
onward toward the Atlantic Coast. The Chippeways, 
Ottawas and Pottawatamies, he thinks, came from the 
same quarter and by the same route. The Mascoutens, 
passing down the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, went 
round the lake into Wisconsin. And the Sacs and 
Foxes, moving down the eastern shore of Lake Huron 
and coming in contact with the Hurons, were forced to 
change their course westward across Michigan into the 
same State. 1 Not a few of these tribes are known to 
have been Mound Builders. Thomas assigns to the 
Delawares the box-shaped stone graves of the Delaware 
Valley and most of those in Ohio, and to their kindred, 
the Shawnees, the stone graves and mounds south of 
the Ohio in Kentucky, Tennessee and northern Georgia, 
and such works as Fort Hill and Fort Ancient in the 
State of Ohio. The Chippeways have also built mounds 
within the historic period, and I am satisfied that the 
works in the vicinity of Laporte, Ind., and, in fact, those 
throughout southwestern Michigan and northwestern 
Indiana, were thrown up by the Miamis, Sacs (Sauks) 
and Pottawatamies. 

That the Muskokis were Mound Builders is a fact of 
history to be found in the books written by the early 
Spanish and French explorers and settlers of the lower 
Mississippi Valley. "Their legends," says Brinton, "re- 
ferred to the west and the northwest as the direction 
whence their ancestors had wandered." 

As it is a fact of history, tradition and archaeology 



1 "American Archaeology," pp. 158, 159, 



274 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



that the tribes just mentioned erected mounds, we enter 
the discussion with the presumption that they v/ere the 
Mound Builders. And, as they all came into their his- 
toric seats from the north or northwest, we may con- 
sider it reasonably certain that all the mound-building 
tribes came from those directions, and not from the 
south, as the Book of Mormon teaches. 

THE MOUND-BUILDING EPOCH BEGAN AND ENDED TOO LATE 
FOR THE MOUND BUILDERS TO HAVE BEEN THE JARED- 
ITES AND NEPHITES. 

Many different opinions have been expressed emong 
archaeologists as to the age of the mounds. As already 
mentioned, Baldwin is disposed to identify their builders 
with the Toltecs, which, according to his theory, would 
necessitate them leaving the valleys at least one thou- 
sand years before Christ, back of which he would have 
"a very long period" during which they flourished in 
their ancient seats. 1 Foster agrees substantially with 
Baldwin. 2 Nott and Gliddon are also of the opinion that 
the Mound Builders were the Toltecs, but, as they defer 
the latter's advent into Mexico to the seventh century 
A. D., they would give the mound-building age a much 
more recent close. 3 Bancroft thinks that a thousand 
years must have elapsed since some of the works were 
abandoned. 4 Donnelly, who also is of the opinion that 
the Mound Builders immigrated into Mexico, has them 
leave the valleys at some time between 29 A. D. and 231 
A. D. 5 Short is of the opinion that a thousand or two 
thousand years must have elapsed since they left their 

1 "Ancient America," pp. 51, 52. 

2 "Prehistoric Races," p. 341. 

3 "Types of Mankind," p. 286. 

4 "Native Races," Vol. IV., p. 790. 

5 "Atlantis," p. 384. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



275 



original seats, and eight hundred since they left the Gulf 
Coast. 1 And Professor Shaler, who believes that they 
were not distinct from the American Indians, would 
bring the mound-building period to a close about 1000 
A. D., but claims that they "had not quite abandoned 
the mound-building habit when they came in contact 
with the whites." 2 

Later research makes it necessary to reject the as- 
sumption of a very great antiquity for the mounds. 
There is no reason for beginning the mound-building 
period before the birth of Christ, while it is known to 
have closed within the last one hundred years. 

Johnston's "Encyclopedia" (Art. "Mound Builders") 
says on this point : "The period when the Mound Build- 
ers flourished has been differently estimated ; but there 
is a growing tendency to reject the assumption of a very 
great antiquity. There is no good reason for assigning 
any of the remains in the Ohio Valley an age antecedent 
to the Christian era ; and the final destruction of their 
towns may well have been but a few generations before 
the discovery of the continent by Columbus." 

Brinton ("Myths of the New World," p. 30) inci- 
dentally speaks of "the dispersion of the Mound Build- 
ers of the Ohio Valley" as "in the fifteenth century." 
And yet Thomas declares that some of the most remark- 
able works of that State "were built subsequent to the 
discvery of the continent by Europeans." 

On the antiquity of the mounds, Dr. C. A. Peterson, 
in a paper, "The Mound-building Age in North Amer- 
ica," read before the Missouri Historical Society and 
published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch of February 16, 
1902, says : "In conclusion, let it be reiterated that there 



1 "North Americans of Antiquity," p. 106. 

2 "Nature and Man in America," p. 182. 



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never was an iota of evidence m existence tending to 
establish the contention that people, other than the 
American Indian, erected the mounds, nor a belief that 
any were erected more than one thousand years ago." 

And, on the antiquity of the mound-building epoch, 
Thomas writes : "As mound-building in this division had 
not ceased when Europeans appeared upon the scene, it 
may be inferred from the data presented that one thou- 
sand years preceding that date would suffice for the 
beginning and development of the custom and for the 
construction of all the known works. That it may have 
continued for a much longer time is not denied; all that 
is claimed here is that there is nothing which has as yet 
been found pertaining to the mounds and other ancient 
works of the division which bears incontestable evidence 
of reaching back more than a thousand years previous 
to the discovery by Columbus." — American Archaeology, 
p. 152. 

Other archaeologists have also come to the conclusion 
that the age of the Mound Builders was not as remote 
as was once believed. Judge Force fixed upon the sev- 
enth century as their most flourishing period. Stronck 
began the mound-building age with the first century of 
our era. Hellwald made them contemporary with Char- 
lemagne. And Henshaw says that an antiquity of "a 
thousand or more years has been assigned to some of the 
mounds." I do not hesitate to say that most of our later 
archaeologists have come to the conclusion that the begin- 
ning of the mound-building period is to be fixed at a date 
this side of the birth of Christ, and that this period over- 
lapped tne coming of the Europeans by a considerable 
numbei of years. This makes it impossible for the 
Mound Builders to have been either the Jaredites or 
Nephites, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



277 



Various arguments have been advanced by those of 
the opposite school to prove the high antiquity of the 
mounds, and as these have been employed by the Mor- 
mons to support the Book of Mormon, I shall examine 
them here. 

I. It has been asserted that the mounds are not found 
on the lowest river terraces, on account of which it has 
been inferred that these terraces must have been formed 
since the mounds were built, and as centuries are re- 
quired for natural agencies to create such formations, 
it has been concluded that a long period of time must 
have elapsed since the Mound Builders ended their work. 

But the claim that mounds were not built upon 
the lowest river terraces is not strictly true. "Recent 
discoveries," says Nadaillac, "enable us to add that some 
of the mounds rise from the most recent alluvial de- 
posits." — Prehistoric America, p. 185. As for the rest 
it is very evident that they were not built upon the lower 
levels, because of the danger from the immense floods 
which in springtime inundate the river valleys. When 
we come to consider that the difference in level of the 
upper Mississippi at its mouth at low and high water is 
thirty-five feet, that of the Missouri at its mouth from 
thirty to thirty-five feet, and that of the Ohio at Louis- 
ville, forty-two feet, we need go no further for the 
reason that these earthworks were usually built upon 
higher ground. 

Foster, a believer in the high antiquity of the 
mounds, writes: "Squier and Davis hastily stated that 
none of these works occupied the alluvial bottoms (an 
error which Mr. Squier subsequently corrected), and 
from this statement the most erroneous conclusions as 
to their antiquity have been drawn. There is nothing 
to indicate but that these works were constructed after 



278 



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the surface had assumed its present configuration, and 
that the climate had become essentially as it is now. 
That they should not occur as abundantly on the bottoms 
as on the terraces, is not to be wondered at, when we 
consider the great fluctuations of the Mississippi and its 
tributaries." — Prehistoric Races, p. 172. 

And Short, another advocate of the high antiquity 
of the mounds, says : "To any one familiar with the 
great rise and fall which takes place annually in the 
water-level of the Ohio and Mississippi and all of their 
tributaries, the fallacy of such an argument is at once 
apparent." — North Americans of Antiquity, p. 103. 

The building of the mounds upon elevated grounds 
is, therefore, not proof of their great age, but is, with 
more probability, to be explained by the supposition that 
their builders chose these sites in order to escape the 
floods which in springtime cover the lowlands of our 
great American rivers. 

2. Another argument, equally as fallacious, is that a 
great age is to be required for the mounds in order to 
account for the heavy growth of forest trees upon them. 

Trees have been found growing on the mounds 
which, if we are to judge by their annual rings, have 
been standing for three or four hundred years. And, as 
they are surrounded by the decaying bodies of others 
equally as large, it has been inferred that at least six or 
eight centuries, and very probably more, have passed 
since the Mound Builders were here. 

That a period of six or eight centuries, or even more, 
may have elapsed since some of the mounds were built 
will be conceded by all, but when by this evidence it 
comes to prove that the Mound Builders ended their 
work six centuries before Christ, or four centuries after, 
it can not be done ; for nothing certain as to their 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



279 



antiquity can be decided by the growth of our American 
forest trees. I think that the most that can be said from 
this evidence is that some of the mounds were erected 
longer ago than 1492. 

Dr. Lapham found that in Wisconsin trees increased 
one foot in diameter in from fifty- four to 130 years, the 
rapidity of growth depending upon the kind of tree. 
And, as but few of those living were over three or four 
feet in diameter, he concluded that they could not pos- 
sibly date from a period earlier than the sixteenth cen- 
tury, and were probably much younger. Dr. Hoy, 
of the same State, in a pamphlet, "Who Built the 
Mounds?" states that, of a number of kinds of trees 
planted in the streets of Racine in 1847 and 1848, white 
elms measured, in 1882, from six to eight feet in circum- 
ference ; maples, from four to six feet ; willows, eight 
feet; and poplars, from eight and one-half to nine feet. 
All this goes to show that the growth of our forest trees 
is so rapid that by it it can not be proved that one of the 
mounds was standing a thousand years ago, and this 
antiquity will be granted to some of them by all. 

The following facts from Dr. C. A. Peterson's paper, 
"The Mound-building Age in America," will show how 
quickly a forest will cover a mound. In Elbert County, 
Georgia, at the junction of the Tugelo and Broad Rivers, 
there formerly existed a large town of the Cherokee, 
Uchee or Creek Indians. It was very probably visited 
by De Soto in 1540, as several of his chroniclers describe 
it in their narratives of that ill-starred expedition. Ac- 
cording to these narratives, the house of the chief was 
perched upon a high mound with the town below at the 
base. William Bartram, the botanist, visited the site in 
1775 and found the mound and the village grounds cov- 
ered with the cornfield of an English planter, the mound 



280 



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yielding one hundred bushels of corn per year. He 
describes it as being, at the time of his visit, between 
forty and fifty feet high, flat at the apex, and the spiral 
path running from base to summit still visible. He also 
mentions a single red cedar growing upon its summit. 
The site was visited in 1848 by Mr. George White, 
author of "White's Statistics of Georgia," who found 
the sides and summit of the mound covered with cane 
and a number of large trees. It was visited again in 
1886 by an agent of the Smithsonian Institution, who 
found it covered with such trees as the sugarberry, 
walnut, hickory and oak, a sugarberry being six feet in 
circumference, a walnut five feet, a hickory three and 
one-half, and an oak, ten; and this all in 11 1 years. 

3. It has been assumed, in the third place, that the 
mounds are of a very great age because the skeletons 
found in them are always in a badly-decayed condition. 
It is declared that skeletons known to have lain in burial- 
places in England and elsewhere for two thousand years 
are in a better state of preservation than are many that 
come from the mounds, and it is argued from this that 
those of the Mound Builders must be more ancient. 

In answering this argument, I can not do better than 
to quote from Dr. Foster, himself an advocate of the 
high antiquity of the mounds. "Inferences drawn from 
the condition of skeletons form no reliable guide as to 
the lapse of time in which they have lain in the earth. 
Their condition depends, to a great extent, on the me- 
chanical texture of the soil, and the presence or absence 
of antiseptic properties held in chemical solution by the 
filtrating waters." — Prehistoric Races, p. 370. 

The skeletons of the Mound Builders are not more 
decayed than are many of those that come from known 
Indian village sites. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



281 



4. Still another argument to prove the great antiquity 
of the mounds is the faint resemblance of one of those 
in Wisconsin to the mastodon, a beast which is commonly 
supposed to be long extinct. 

But, in the first place, it is very improbable that the 
Wisconsin mound was ever intended to represent a mas- 
todon. Professor Thomas, who surveyed it in 1884, 
says : "Take, for example, the supposed elephant mound 
of Wisconsin which has played such an important role 
in most of the works relating to the mound builders of 
the Mississippi Valley, but is now generally conceded to 
be the effigy of a bear, the snout, the elephantine feature, 
resulting from drifting sand." — American Archaeology, 

P- 2 4- 

And, in the second place, if it were intended to be 
the effigy of a mastodon, it would not necessarily prove 
the long dispersion of the Mound Builders, for it is now 
generally conceded that this beast was an inhabitant of 
this continent only a few centuries ago. "That the 
mammoth was exterminated by the arrows of the Indian 
hunters," says Lyell, "is the first idea presented to the 
mind of almost every naturalist." And Henshaw states : 
"Mastodon bones have been exhumed from peat beds in 
this country at a depth which, so far as is proved by the 
rate of deposition, implies that the animal may- have 
been alive within five hundred years." — Second Rept. 
Bu. Am. Ethno., p. 153. 

5. Lastly, it is asserted that the mounds must be of 
great antiquity because the Indians had no traditions 
touching their building, which they attributed to another 
and a preceding people. 

That the Indians had few traditions touching oie 
building of the mounds, and that they sometimes attrib- 
uted them to preceding tribes, I concede. The latter can 



282 



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be explained as being due to the shif tings of the popula- 
tion, one tribe moving into the territory of another tribe 
truthfully denying the authorship of the ancient works; 
while the absence of traditions, touching the building of 
the mounds, is accounted for as being due to the weak- 
ness of the primitive mind in retaining, after the lapse 
of a few generations, even the most signal events. It is 
a fact much wondered at that the Indians of the Missis- 
sippi Valley, after a few generations, had forgotten all 
about De Soto and his expedition, while the tribes of the 
lakes soon lost all recollection of the Jesuit Fathers. On 
account of this Foster says: "I would not make these 
traditions the basis of an argument for the high antiquity 
of these works ; for among a people who have no written 
language the lapse of a few generations would obliterate 
all knowledge even of the most signal events." — Prehis- 
toric Races, p. 375. 

But that the North American Indians had no tradi- 
tions of mound-building is untrue. 

On the Cherokees Haywood says : "One tradition 
which they have amongst them says they came from the 
west and exterminated the former inhabitants ; and then 
says they came from the upper parts of the Ohio, where 
they erected the mounds on Grave Creek, and that they 
removed thither from the country where Monticello 
(near Charlottesville, Virginia) is situated." — Nineteenth 
Ann. Kept. Bu. Am. Ethno., p. 20. 

If the Cherokees built the large burial-mound on 
Grave Creek, which has been described, they were able 
to erect any of the earthworks and mounds in the 
country. 

The Delawares confirm this tradition with one of 
their own, in which they ascribe the Ohio mounds to 
the Alligewi, Talligewi, Tallegwi or Tallike, whom com- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



283 



petent American philologists identify with the Chero- 
kees, who call themselves Tsalaki. And the Wyandots 
also ag*ee with them. On the tradition of the latter, 
Mooney says : "According to their tradition, as narrated 
in 1802, the ancient fortifications in the Ohio Valley had 
been erected in the course of a long war between them- 
selves and the Cherokee, which resulted finally in the 
defeat of the latter." — Ibid, p. 19. 

On the traditions of mound-building among other 
tribes we have the following from Professor Thomas : 
"According to a Winnebago tradition, mounds in certain 
localities in Wisconsin were built by that tribe, and 
others by the Sacs and Foxes. There is another Indian 
tradition, apparently founded on fact, that the Essex 
mounds in Clinton County, Michigan, are the burying- 
places of those killed in a battle between the Chippewas 
and Pottawatomies, which occurred net many genera- 
tions ago." — Problem of the Ohio Mounds, p. 13. 

At the junction of Straddle Creek and Plumb River, 
Carroll County, Illinois, is a group of burial-mounds. In 
all of these mounds, except one, the only remains of the 
human body to be found were "cinders and a residuum 
of black mould." In this exception, which is situated 
280 yards from the main group, the bodies were simply 
interred. "It is alleged," says Nadaillac, "that tradition 
ascribes this change in the mode of burial to obedience 
to the prophets of the tribe, who were alarmed by an 
eclipse of the sun which occurred whilst the body of one 
of their chiefs was being burnt." — Prehistoric America, 
p. 121. 

On an effigy mound, in the form of the human body, 
in Wisconsin, he says : "It is stated that a more or less 
ancient tradition alleges that this mound was erected in 
honor of a chief killed in battle." — Ibid, p. 124. 



284 



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Thus, we see that tribes of Indians not only had 
traditions of mound-building, but also that these tradi- 
tions plainly identify them with the Mound Builders. 

I pass now to some of the positive evidences by 
which the recent close of the mound-building period is 
established. 

In the first place, it is a fact in history that certain In- 
dian tribes, at the first appearance of the Europeans, were 
building mounds which in size and shape compare favor- 
ably with those attributed to the "veritable Mound Build- 
ers." De Soto's chroniclers declare that they saw many 
occupied as foundations for the buildings of the chiefs 
and principal men of the tribes through whose territory 
they passed and many others in process of erection. 
After stating that "mound-building was beyond question 
continued, at least to some extent, into post-European 
times," Professor Thomas says: "The proof of the last 
statement is found in both historical and monumental 
evidence. The chroniclers of De Soto's strange and un- 
fortunate expedition through the Gulf States in 1540-2, 
whose statements could not have been warped by any 
preconceived opinions in regard to the authorship of 
these works, speak so positively as to the building and use 
thereof by the Indians as to leave no doubt that the 
custom of building and using mounds had not been 
abandoned at that date in the sections through which the 
expedition passed. They not only make repeated allu- 
sions to them, but state expressly that they were built 
and used by the Indians." — American Archaeology, p. 
140. 

The chroniclers of this expedition were Biedma, Gar- 
cilasso de la Vega and the Gentleman of Elvas. With 
them, on this point, agree such early French writers as 
De Tonti, St. Cosme, De la Source, Joutel, Cravier, Peni- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



285 



cault, La Petit, De la Harpe and Du Pratz, who came in 
contact with the tribes of the lower Mississippi some 
years afterwards. The historical evidence of mound- 
building will be noticed more fully later on. 

In the second place, articles have been found in some 
of the mounds which positively prove their post-Colum- 
bian erection. On this point Professor Thomas writes : 
"From a mound in Wisconsin were obtained a few silver 
crosses, silver brooches and silver bracelets, one of the 
last with the word 'Montreal' stamped on it in plain 
letters. These evidently pertained to an intrusive burial. 
In another Wisconsin mound, which stands in the midst 
of a group of effigies, was found, lying at the bottom on 
the original surface of the ground, near the center, a 
genuine, regularly-formed gunflint. In another, in Ten- 
nessee, some six feet high and which showed no signs 
of disturbance, an old-fashioned, horn-handled case- 
knife was discovered near the bottom. Far down in 
another of large size and also in comparatively modern 
Indian graves, at widely different points, have been 
found little sleigh-bells, probably what were formerly 
known as 'hawk-bells,' made of copper, with pebble and 
shell-bead rattles, and all of precisely the same pattern 
and finish. From a group in northern Mississippi, in the 
locality formerly occupied by the Chickasaws, were 
obtained a silver plate with the Spanish coat-of-arms 
stamped upon it, and the iron portions of a saddle. At 
the bottom of a North Carolina mound parts of an iron 
blade and an iron awl were discovered in the hands of 
the principal personage buried therein; with these were 
engraved shells and polished celts. At the bottom of an 
undisturbed Pennsylvania mound, accompanying the 
original interment, of which but slight evidence re- 
mained, was a joint of large cane, wrapped in pieces of 



286 



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thin and evenly wrought silver foil, smoothly cut in 
fancy figures. In addition to these, the assistants have 
obtained from mounds such things as brass kettles with 
iron bails, brass wire, wooden ladles, glass beads, etc. 
Some of these things clearly pertained to intrusive 
burials, but a large portion of them were evidently placed 
in the mounds at the time they were constructed and 
with the original interment, as shown by their position 
when discovered." — Work in Mound Exploration, p. 9. 

These articles indicate contact with European civili- 
zation, and as some of them were found at the bottom 
of the mounds, or so near the bottom as to make it 
impossible for them to have been intrusive burials, it is 
positively certain that the mounds in which they were 
found were erected in post-Columbian times. 

With no well-founded evidence of their high antiq- 
uity, and with so much to prove the recentness of some 
of their works, we are justified, contrary to the Book of 
Mormon, in assigning the Mound Builders to a very late 
period in the history of ancient America. 

THE CULTURE OF THE MOUND BUILDERS WAS FAR BELOW 
WHAT THAT OF THE J AREDITES AND NEPHITES IS DE- 
CLARED TO HAVE BEEN, AND WAS IN NO WAY DIF- 
FERENT FROM, NOR SUPERIOR TO, THAT OF THE INDIAN 
TRIBES WHEN THEY WERE FIRST SEEN BY THE WHITES. 

The Book of Mormon declares that the ancient in- 
habitants of the United States were races of people 
considerably above the American Indians in point of 
culture. They were monotheists, and the Nephites prac- 
ticed the virtues, observed the ordinances and entertained 
the tenets of the Christian religion. Their governments 
were well-organized and had their seats in Central 
America, or perhaps, in the case of the Nephites, farther 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



287 



south in the United States of Colombia. They had well- 
drilled armies that could be assembled in an incredibly 
short time. They built cities of wood and cement. They 
tilled the soil. They built ships and carried on commerce 
with the distant parts of their empires. They manu- 
factured tools, weapons and implements of iron and 
steel. They had secret societies. And they employed 
phonetic systems of writing by which they recorded the 
events in their history. These, in brief, are the chief 
features of the civilization of those peoples who, the 
Book of Mormon declares, inhabited the United States 
of America in ancient times. 

But this is all an empty dream. The latest word that 
the field worker sends to us is that the status of the 
Mound Builders was not superior to, nor essentially 
different from, that of the more-advanced tribes of 
North American Indians when these were first met by 
the whites. As the exploration of the mounds has con- 
tinued, the apparent "chasm" between their builders and 
the Indians has gradually decreased in width until to-day 
no chasm remains and the two people are known to have 
been identical. The truth of this assertion is more ap- 
parent to the field worker than to the ordinary reader, as 
he has before him the actual works of these peoples 
instead of the sensational books written by theorists, 
many of whom never did any field work at all. 1 

Two objections are to be urged against the character 

1 "One 'popular' book by a superficial observer has a bad influence 
and does more harm than can be remedied by much honest, conscientious 
endeavor on the part of workers in the field. Those who have endured 
the rains of spring, the heat of summer, the chilly snows and sleet of 
winter, living in thin tents or barnlike sheds alongside the tumuli that 
must be studied inch by inch with pick and shovel, have a right to cry 
out in honest indignation when the reports of men who have never thrust 
a spade into the structures they attempt to describe pretend to be con- 
clusive on t'his subject." — "Primitive Man," Preface, 



288 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



of the evidence employed by Mormon writers to prove 
their theory of the high civilization of the ancient North 
Americans. In the first place, much of it comes from 
yellow journalism and other questionable sources. They 
are especially partial to sensational newspaper write-ups. 
And, in the second, much of it is out of date, being 
derived from the works written before the more ex- 
tended and careful investigations had been made. Since 
the Bureau of Ethnology was organized in 1879 more 
exact and scientific methods of research have been em- 
ployed, with the result that many false theories have 
been exposed and exploded. Let the reader consider 
that the works upon which Mormon writers chiefly de- 
pend to prove the high civilization of the Mound Build- 
ers were nearly all written before that date. Baldwin's 
work was published in 1871 ; Foster's, in 1873 ; Ban- 
croft's, in 1875 ; MacLean's, in 1879; while Short's ap- 
peared in 1880 and Donnelly's in 1882. On the other 
hand, Powell, Henshaw, Carr, Holmes, Thomas, Brinton 
and ethers of the opposite school have done most of their 
writing since the more extended investigations began to 
be made. 

The works of art found in the mounds, when com- 
pared with the works of art of the Indian tribes who 
inhabited the continent at the time of its settlement by 
Europeans, are found to be so much like them that it is 
impossible to distinguish between the two. Says Nadail- 
lac : "For the most part the objects found in them, from 
the rude knife to the carved and polished 'gorget,' might 
have been taken from the inmost recesses of a mound 
or picked up on the surface among the debris of a recent 
Indian village, and the most experienced archaeologist 
could not decide which was their origin." — Prehistoric 
America, p. 131. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



289 



The two peoples were alike in so many things and 
different in so few that there can be said to be no just 
line of demarkation between them. Both erected mounds 
and inclosures ; both chipped arrowheads out of flint, 
chert and chalcedony and manufactured celts, axes and 
pestles out of diorite, hematite and other similar ma- 
terials; both made and used the so-called "Monitor" 
pipe ; both were semi-agricultural ; both buried their dead 
in a sitting posture and surrounded them with bark, or 
deposited them in stone graves ; both built circular hab- 
itations ; both employed mounds as bases for buildings, 
etc. As the Indians were the only occupants of the 
mound territory at the coming of the whites, these 
analogies amount almost to proof of the identity of the 
two peoples. The burden, therefore, rests with the 
other side to show why this identification should not be 
accepted. 

So much alike are the relics of the Mound Builders 
and the Indians that the former chief of the Smithsonian 
Institution, Major J. W. Powell, does not hesitate to pro- 
nounce the two peoples one and the same. He says: 
"The research of the past ten or fifteen years has put 
this subject in a proper light. First, the annals of the 
Columbian epoch have been carefully studied, and it is 
found that some of the mounds have been constructed in 
historical time, while early explorers and settlers found 
many actually used by tribes of North American In- 
dians; so we know many of them were builders of 
mounds. Again, hundreds and thousands of these 
mounds have been carefully examined, and the works of 
art found therein have been collected and assembled in 
museums. At the same time, the works of art of the 
Indian tribes, as they were produced before modification 
by European culture, have been assembled in the same 



290 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



museums, and the classes of collections have been care- 
fully compared. All this has been done with the greatest 
painstaking, and the mound builders' arts and the In- 
dians' arts are found to be substantially identical. No 
fragment of evidence remains to support the figment of 
theory that there was an ancient race of mound builders 
superior in culture to the North American Indians. . . . 
It is enough to say that the mound builders were the 
Indian tribes discovered by white men." — From "Prehis- 
toric Man in America," an article in the Forum of Jan- 
uary, 1890. Quoted in "Cherokees in Pre-Columbian 
Times," pp. 38, 39. 

One of the best books on mound exploration is 
"Primitive Man in Ohio," by Warren K. Moorehead. 
The author, in four seasons of exploration, part of the 
time under the direction of the World's Columbian Ex- 
position, excavated 107 mounds, graves and cemeteries. 
On the culture of the Mound Builders of Ohio he says: 
"Nothing more than the upper status of savagery was 
attained by any race or tribe living within the limits of 
the present State of Ohio. All statements to the con- 
trary are misrepresentations. If we go by field testi- 
mony alone (not to omit the reports of early travelers 
among North American tribes), we can assign primitive 
man high attainments in but few things, and these indi- 
cate neither civilization nor an approach toward it." — 
Primitive Man, pp. 199, 200. 

And Professor Thomas, of the Smithsonian Institu- 
tion, who has excavated as many mounds probably as 
any explorer, says: "Nothing trustworthy has been dis- 
covered to justify the theory that the mound builders be- 
longed to a highly civilized race, or that they were a 
people who had attained a higher culture status than the 
Indians. It is true that works and papers on American 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



291 



archaeology are full of statements to the contrary, which 
are generally based on the theory that the mound build- 
ers belonged to a race of much higher culture than the 
Indians. Yet, when the facts on which this opinion is 
based are examined with sober, scientific care, the splen- 
did fabric which has been built upon them by that great 
workman, imagination, fades from sight." — Work in 
Mound Exploration, pp. 11, 12. 

One of the chief arguments relied upon to prove the 
superior culture of the Mound Builders was their ability 
to build circular and square intrenchments. It is asserted 
that many of those found in Ohio and elsewhere are so 
exact in dimensions that their builders must have had 
some knowledge of geometrical principles in order to 
construct them. Elder Stebbins declares that the fifteen 
hundred inclosures in the State of Ohio are of "perfect 
geometrical precision, as good as could be made to-day 
by the best student of geometry." — Lectures, p. 83. And 
of course along with this belief the assumption is 
made that the Indians not only lacked the ability, but 
also the disposition, to perform the labor necessary to 
throw up these earthworks. But these assumptions are 
both wrong, for the mounds and inclosures are not only 
lacking in geometrical exactness, but history shows that 
the American Indians, before their contact with Euro- 
pean greed and vices, had both the ability and disposi- 
tion to perform such labor. 

Professor Thomas, in the "Twelfth Annual Report 
of the Bureau of American Ethnology," p. 645, refutes 
the argument of the geometrical exactness of the 
mounds. He says : "One serious objection urged against 
the theory that the Indians were the authors of the 
ancient works is that the great number of them, the 
magnitude of some of them, and the art displayed 



2Q2 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



in their construction, indicate a centralized and syste- 
matic form of government and a skill foreign to 
and entirely above the culture status of the Indians. 
This opinion is based largely upon the statements made 
in regard to these works and their contents, which a 
more careful examination has shown in many cases to 
be erroneous and overdrawn. For example, the estimates 
as to size where given without careful measurements are, 
as a very general rule, largely in excess of the true 
dimensions. The statement so often made that many of 
these monuments have been constructed with such math- 
ematical accuracy as to indicate not only a unit of meas- 
ure, but also the use of instruments, is found upon 
re-examination to be without any basis, unless the near 
approach of some three or four circles and as many 
squares of Ohio to mathematical correctness be sufficient 
to warrant this opinion. As a very general, and in fact, 
almost universal, rule, the figures are more or less 
irregular and indicate nothing higher in art than an 
Indian could form with his eye and by pacing. Circles 
and squares are simple figures known to ali savage tribes 
and easily formed; hence the fact that a few, and a very 
few, approach mathematical accuracy is not sufficient to 
counterbalance the amount of evidence on the other side." 

"We should have to descend low in the scale of 
humanity indeed," says Dellenbaugh, "to find a tribe 
that could not make a cord long enough to lay out any 
circle yet discovered on this continent. There is nothing 
difficult about it. The largest circle at Xewark has a 
diameter of about a thousand feet. This would require 
a rope only five hundred feet long, which would be noth- 
ing for any tribe on the continent to make." — North 
Americans of Yesterday, pp. 346, 347. 

That the American Indians had both the mechanical 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



293 



ability and the disposition to build earthen mounds and 
fortifications, are facts of history. "To assert," says 
Professor Carr, "that the Indian would not have sub- 
mitted to the labor requisite for the construction of these 
mounds is virtually to beg the whole question. So far 
is this from being true that there is probably no fact in 
American archaeology better authenticated than that the 
red Indian has, within the historical epoch, voluntarily 
built both mounds and earthworks." — Smithsonian Re- 
port for 1891, p. 534. 

There is nothing in any mound in the Mississippi 
Valley which would require in men, skill or systematic 
labor, more than could be furnished by such tribes as 
the Iroquois, Cherokees and Chata Muskokis. Mr. Ge- 
rard Fowke, who has a wide reputation as an archaeolo- 
gist, shows that a mound one hundred feet in diameter 
at the base and twenty feet high could be thrown up 
with the simple means that the Mound Builders had at 
hand by one hundred men in forty-two days. This is 
concurred in by Professor Thomas. 1 The great Cahokia 
mound, the largest in the country, contained 25,000,000 
cubic feet of earth. One thousand men with hand bar- 
rows, the vehicles used as shown by the individual loads 
that can be traced in the mounds, each bearing one-half 
of a cubic foot of earth at a load and bringing twenty- 
five loads a day, could throw up the mound in two thou- 
sand days. Now, such a task would not be arduous, and 
as for meji any one of the above-mentioned tribes could 
have provided them. In 1735 Adair estimated that the 
Cherokees could muster more than six thousand fighting 
men, while the whole number of individuals in the tribe 
amounted to between sixteen and seventeen thousand 



"American Archaeology," pp. 63, 64. 



294 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



souls. 1 And Mr. Kirkand, a missionary among the 
Oneidas, estimated in 1783 the total number of warriors 
in the Six Nations at more than four thousand. 2 Besides, 
the Mound Builders frequently made use of natural 
elevations, changing and enlarging them to suit their 
purpose, and worked intermittently. 

The Mound Builders and the American Indians built 
the same kinds of habitations. At various points in the 
mound region what archaeologists call "hut rings" are 
still to be made out. These rings are from fifteen to 
fifty feet in diameter, the inclosed area being depressed. 
They are found in Tennessee, Illinois and southeastern 
Missouri and were frequently seen in Ohio, according to 
Squier and Davis, before the plow had done its work of 
obliteration. Excavations in the center of these rings 
usually bring to light cracked stones, ashes, fragments 
of pottery and animal bones, which mark the hearths. 
Nadaillac gives this description of the hut rings at 
Sandy Woods, Missouri : "As at Greenwood, circular 
trenches marked the site of dwellings. They are about 
two feet deep by twenty-eight feet in diameter. The 
presence, in some particular spots, of heaps of burnt clay, 
cinders, fragments of charcoal and the calcined bones of 
animals indicate the hearths. They were generally in the 
center of the habitation, and, as is the custom among 
numerous savage tribes, the smoke escaped through a 
hole made in the roof." — Prehistoric America, p. 96. 

The circles at Greenwood, Tenn., referred to in the 
foregoing, were made by a people, according to Pro- 
fessor Putnam, who were one of the most forward tribes 
in North America. They tilled the soil. They buried 
their dead instead of burning them. They were experts 

1 "Nineteenth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 34. 

2 "The Ten Tribes," p. 97, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



295 



in the manufacture of pottery and ornaments. And they 
made long journeys to obtain copper from Lake Superior 
and shells from the Atlantic Coast. They also built 
mounds and fortifications, which classes them with the 
Mound Builders. 

But it requires no advanced knowledge of aboriginal 
American architecture to discover that these circular 
huts were identical with the Algonkin wigwams of post- 
Columbian times. 

Another class of dwellings, the remains of which are 
found on the mounds of Arkansas, Missouri and Missis- 
sippi, were evidently square. Their sites are marked by 
three layers of debris: the first of common soil from one 
to two feet thick; the second of burnt clay of from four 
inches to a foot thick, and the third of hardened muck 
or dark clay. In the lower stratum skeletons are usually 
found. The middle layer is supposed to have been the 
plastering of the walls, which had fallen where it is 
found, as it always occurs in lumps and with it the evi- 
dences of cane lathing. It is thought that these struc- 
tures were built by planting upright posts in the ground, 
then weaving in and out among them laths of split cane, 
and finally coating the whole with clay. These were 
without doubt habitations of the Mound Builders, and 
yet Du Pratz saw just such cabins erected by the Indian 
tribes of that section at the beginning of the eighteenth 
century. 1 

The Book of Mormon declares that the ancient in- 
habitants of the United States erected cities, temples, 
synagogues and sanctuaries, using for the purpose wood 
and cement. "And there being but little timber upon the 
face of the land, nevertheless the people who went forth 

1 "American Archaeology," pp. i35-i37« 



296 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



became exceeding expert in the working of cement; 
therefore they did build houses of cement, in the which 
they did dwell." — Helaman 2: 1. 

But the Mound Builders used neither cut stone nor 
mortar in the construction of their fortifications and 
habitations. Frequently rough stones were used, but 
these were simply thrown together or laid up in rude 
piles and were not held in place by cement of any kind. 
As an example of this, we have the fortress at Bourne- 
ville, Ohio, whose walls, which are two miles and a quar- 
ter in length, were made of rough stones. The walls of 
Fort Hill, of the same State, were likewise built of stones 
mingled with earth. And mounds made of rough stones 
piled together are sometimes found in the same section. 

"The Mound Builders," says Nadaillac, "used the 
materials at hand. When stones were abundant, they 
piled them up with earth to make their walls, but these 
stones are never quarried or dressed, nor are they ever 
cemented with any mortar ; several instances may be 
quoted, notably a stone fort on the Duck River, near 
Manchester, Tennessee, in which the walls are of un- 
worked stones, detached from neighboring rocks." — Pre- 
historic America, p. 89. 

And Bancroft states: "There is no instance of walls 
built of stone that has been hewn or otherwise artificially 
prepared, of the use of mortar, of even rough stones laid 
with regularity, of adobes or earth otherwise prepared, 
or of material brought from any great distance." — Native 
Races, Vol. IV., p. 753. 

In respect to the building materials employed, the 
Mound Builders were even inferior to our historic Indian 
tribes of the Southwest, who have made use of cut stone 
and mortar from time immemorial. 

The Mound Builders, like the Indians, had not pro- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



297 



gressed beyond the use of stone as the material out of 
which they manufactured their arrowheads, knives and 
axes. Manufactured iron was unknown amongst them, 
although iron ore and meteoric iron were sometimes 
made into implements and ornaments. This, of course, is 
directly at variance with the teachings of the Book of 
Mormon, according to which the Mound Builders "did 
make gold, and silver, and iron, and brass, and all man- 
ner of metals." 

Foster states : "No implement of iron has been found 
in connection with the ancient civilizations of America. 
The mound builders, as we have seen, wrought as a 
stone, the rich specular ores of Missouri, into various 
instruments, which they ground and polished with elabo- 
rate care, little conscious that the same material, sub- 
jected to a high heat, could be cast into any required 
form, and converted into much more efficient weapons." 
— Prehistoric Races, p. 333. 

And Professor Thomas says: "The mound builders 
had neither iron nor steel of which to form spades and 
shovels, nor had they beasts of burden to assist in the 
transportation of material." — American Archaeology, p. 
61. 

A number of Mormon works contain descriptions of 
iron implements taken from the mounds which are held 
up as proof that the Mound Builders were an iron-work- 
ing people. 1 But, as has heretofore been shown, these 
implements do not prove that the Mound Builders were 
iron workers, but that some of the mounds have been 
erected within post-Columbian times, as they all bear the 
marks of European workmanship. 



1 "Book of Mormon Lectures," pp. 276, 277. "Divinity of the Book 
of Mormon Proven by Archaeology," pp. 112, 113. "Parsons' Text-book," 
pp. 7, 8. "Book of Mormon Verified," p. 14. "Ruins Revisited," p. 208. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



If the reader will consult Moorehead's "Primitive 
Man in Ohio," Thomas' "American Archaeology," and 
similar works, he will find how identical the implements 
from the mounds are with the implements manufactured 
by the Indians, and how dissimilar they are to the imple- 
ments of a people in the culture grade of the Jaredites 
and Nephites. The mound relics are flint knives, spear- 
heads and arrowheads; shell and slate gorgets; pots; 
bone awls, needles and scrapers ; stone celts and axes ; 
copper plates, pounded and rolled out while the metal 
was cold ; copper, spool-shaped ornaments ; perforated 
animal teeth, etc. In a single cache Moorehead found 
7,232 large flint discs, the size of the human hand, while 
from another mound he took a head-dress made of wood 
to represent the antlers of an elk, the whole being neatly 
covered with sheet copper which had been rolled over the 
wood. 1 These finds are the most remarkable recorded in 
his book, yet neither the discs nor the head-dress were 
above the ability of the American Indian. 

The aboriginal cemetery at Madisonville, Ohio, is one 
of the largest of its kind in the United States. It occu- 
pies a plateau, facing the Little Miami, and is one-half 
mile west of Batavia Junction on the P. C. C. & St. L. 
Railroad. This cemetery was accidentally discovered in 
March, 1879, by a laborer in the employ of Dr. C. L. 
Metz. It was rich in Mound Builder relics, and from it 
have been taken fourteen hundred crania. With the 
skeletons have been found such articles as flint and stone 
implements ; stone pipes ; pots ; charred matting ; tools 
and implements of bone, shell and copper ; chisels of horn 
and flint; perforated stones, and unto shells. With these 
were intermingled carbonized maize, cracked bowlders 



1 "Primitive Man," pp. 189, 194. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



2gg 



and the bones of the deer, elk, raccoon, opossum, mink, 
woodchuck, beaver and turkey, which all go to show that 
the Mound Builders buried there were only semi-agri- 
cultural, depending in a great measure upon the chase 
for their food supply. 1 

From a mound in Tennessee, 220 feet long by 184 
feet broad and 14 feet high, ninety skeletons were taken, 
and with them such articles as pots ; stone pipes, chisels, 
celts and axes ; discoidal stones ; flint arrowheads and 
nodules ; engraved shells ; gorgets ; shell masks and pins ; 
beads ; red paint ; bear teeth, etc. 2 Nothing that would 
indicate a civilization like that attributed to the Jaredites 
and Nephites. 

No relics essentially different from these, nor requir- 
ing more skill in their manufacture, have ever been 
found in the mound region, and this is leading archaeolo- 
gists to believe that the Mound Builders were only tribes 
of American Indians after all. 

In their ceramic arts the Mound Builders were not in 
advance of such Indian tribes as the Iroquois, Natchez 
and Delawares. Both made earthen vessels, and the work 
of each, in many instances, is of high order, even supe- 
rior to the pottery of Europe in the same period of 
development. The pottery of the Mound Builders was 
manufactured out of a dark gray or blue clay, which was 
given more consistency by being mixed with sand, frag- 
ments of shells, bits of quartz, mica and feldspar, or par- 
ticles of the carbonate of lime. Squier and Davis assert 
that real ovens existed in Ohio in which pottery was 
baked. Vessels were formed in a variety of ways. Some 
were moulded in baskets, some in nets of cord, others in 
holes in the ground, and still others were made by coiling 



1 "Primitive Man," pp. 49-58. 

2 "American Archaeology," p. 84. 



3oo 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



round and round, from bottom to top, long, slender ropes 
of clay, after which the whole was carefully smoothed 
with the hand, a shell or some other instrument. Ameri- 
can pottery is soft, unglazed ware, is moulded in various 
shapes, and is covered with fantastic and highly-colored 
designs. 

But no line can be drawn between the Mound Build- 
ers and the American Indians here. They used the same 
materials, manufactured their vessels in the same ways, 
and covered them with the same fantastic designs. 
Among the articles taken from the mounds are large 
pots, some holding several quarts, earthen jars and long- 
necked bottles. But just such vessels were made by his- 
toric Indian tribes before they lost the art by the intro- 
duction of European wares. Du Pratz states that the 
Natchez made "pots of an extraordinary size, cruses with 
a medium-sized opening, jars, bottles with long necks 
holding two pints, and pots or cruses for holding bear's 
oil." 1 

Among the articles taken from the Ohio mounds by 
Squier and Davis was a vase with a bird's head engraved 
upon it. It appears in many works on American archae- 
ology as proof of the superiority of the ceramic art of 
the Mound Builders over that of the Indians. But Dr. 
Rau, a practical archaeologist, after examining the vase, 
declared that it was in no way superior to clay pottery 
manufactured at Cahokia Creek, Illinois, by recent In- 
dian tribes, and Davis himself, after examining the In- 
dian pottery from that locality, also expressed the same 
opinion. 2 

On the equality of the Indian ceramic art to that of 
the Mound Builders, Nadaillac says : "The Iroquois, 



1 "American Archaeology/' p. 96. 

2 "Ohio Mounds," p. 23. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



301 



Natchez, Delawares and Indians of Florida and Louisi- 
ana made vases, the ornamentation and delicacy of which 
were not in any way inferior to the pottery of the Mound 
Builders, and the curious pipes" — monitor — "of which 
we have spoken, are met with among the Indians of the 
present day." — Prehistoric America, p. 193. 

And Thomas says : "The statement so often made that 
the mound pottery, especially that of Ohio, far excels 
that of the Indians, is not justified by the facts." — Ohio 
Mounds, p. 24. 

The textile fabrics of the Mound Builders, also, were 
no better than those woven by the hands of the American 
Indians. It is commonly assumed that the Indian dressed 
entirely in skins or other natural products and that he did 
not manufacture cloth of any kind, and, as the Mound 
Builders manufactured cloth of hemp, it is assumed that 
there was a wide gulf between the two. But the assump- 
tion that the Indian dressed entirely in skins is false, for 
he, too, made cloth of hemp, and also of cotton and bird 
feathers. "Weaving was not confined to the Pueblo and 
Mexican country when the whites first came to the con- 
tinent, but was in vogue amongst many different tribes, 
who used various substances in the manufacture of rugs 
and blankets. Cotton amongst Southern and Southwest- 
ern tribes was a favorite material, and in other places 
hemp and the hair of animals and birds' feathers were 
used." — North Americans of Yesterday, p. 128. 

W. H. Holmes, in writing on the impressions made 
on mound pottery by the cloth of the Mound Builders, 
says : "Attention should be called to the fact that the 
work described, though varied and ingenious, exhibits no 
characters in execution or design not wholly consonant 
with the art of a stone-age people. There is nothing 
superior to or specifically different from the work of our 



302 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



modern Indians." — Textile Fabrics of the United States 
Derived from Impressions on Pottery in Third Annual 
Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, p. 425. 
And Major J. W. Powell, in the introduction to the 
Third Report, declares that this discovery is "an impor- 
tant deduction," and that it "eliminates one more source 
of error cherished by lovers of the mysterious to estab- 
lish and exalt a supposed race of 'Mound Builders.' " 

In their burial customs the Mound Builders and the 
American Indians were identical. In some localities they 
both removed the flesh from the bones before their final 
interment. Both often buried beneath dwellings Both 
frequently buried the corpse in a sitting posture. Fire 
was employed by both in their burial ceremonies. The 
Mound Builders, Shawnees and Kickapoos buried in 
stone graves. Both placed bark beneath and over their 
dead. The Southern Mound Builders often wrapped the 
corpse in cane matting, and, according to Lawson, certain 
Carolina Indian tribes did the same. And each buried 
with the deceased the ornaments and utensils that he 
had made use of during life. In considering this point, 
in his "Problem of the Ohio Mounds," Professor Thomas 
remarks: "The mortuary customs of the mound build- 
ers, as gleaned from an examination of their burial- 
mounds, ancient cemeteries and other depositories of their 
dead, present so many striking resemblances to those of 
the Indians when first encountered by the whites as to 
leave little room for doubt regarding their identity. Nor 
is this similarity limited to the customs in the broad and 
general sense, but it is carried down to the more minute 
and striking peculiarities." — Ohio Mounds, pp. 18, 19. 

Still another difference that has been assumed be- 
tween the Mound Builders and the Indians is that the 
former were a sedentary people, while the latter are more 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



303 



of the hunter type. The common conception of the for- 
mer is that of a people living in permanent communities, 
building large and substantial structures and depending 
for their livelihood on the cultivation of the soil; the 
common conception of the latter is that of a people of a 
more or less nomadic character, depending for their live- 
lihood chiefly upon the chase. But both of these concep- 
tions are overdrawn, and the more their works are 
studied the stronger becomes the evidence that the 
Mound Builders were only semi-agricultural and that the 
American Indians originally were only semi-hunter. 1 

It has been the habit of those who seek to maintain 
the theory of the lost race to judge the Indian of three 
hundred years ago by the product of European greed 
and vice. And this is an unfair judgment. The Indian 
of to-day is almost as different from his ancestors of the 
sixteenth century as our Southern negro is from the wild 
tribes of Africa. Contact with a foreign civilization and 
foreign vices has wrought this transformation. 

When the whites first appeared on the scene the 
American tribes were manufacturing their pottery out of 
clay, their cloth out of cotton, hemp and bird feathers, 
and their tools out of stone, bone and other natural 
materials. The copper kettle soon took the place of the 
pot of clay and the art of manufacturing pottery in all 
parts declined, while in some it was quite forgotten. The 
brilliantly-colored cloths from the looms of Europe also 
began to supplant those made of hemp and cotton and by 
primitive processes. And the gun and knife of steel soon 
drove out of favor the bow and the knife of flint or bone. 

1 This is ably set forth in the excellent paper, "Mounds of the Mis- 
sissippi Valley," by Mr. Lucien Carr, of Cambridge, Mass., published in 
the "Memoirs of the Kentucky Geological Survey," Vol. II., 1883, and 
republished in the Smithsonian Report for 189 1. 



304 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



The Indian found that a copper kettle and a piece of 
European cloth could be purchased for a bundle of 
beaver skins, and, as these were more serviceable than 
the articles of his own manufacture, he gave up, in a 
great measure, the practice of the arts of pot-making 
and weaving. But, above all, the white man's firewater 
wrought a most disastrous change, and the free and 
liberty-loving son of the forest became a servile slave to 
his appetite, and, as a consequence, manhood, independ- 
ence and land have all gone to satisfy it. 

But Mr. Lucien Carr, in his "Mounds of the Missis- 
sippi Valley/' has proved that there is a wide difference 
between the Indian as he is and as he was. By the 
earlier works of history, description and travel, written 
by white men, he has shown conclusively that, at the time 
of the settlement of America, many of the tribes were 
sedentary and possessed a social standing equal to that 
of the Mound Builders. Others have successfully per- 
formed the same task, until, to-day, we have a mass of 
historical testimony on this point that is simply irrefu- 
table. 

That the Mound Builders depended in part for food 
upon the chase is made evident by the implements of the 
chase and the wild-animal bones found in the mounds 
and cemeteries. On the other hand, when we come to 
consider the manner of life of the Indian tribes, we find 
plenty of evidence to show that they were by no means 
the hunter race that they are said to have been. Colonel 
Force, in speaking of the agricultural habit cf the his- 
toric tribes east of the Mississippi, says : "All the tribes 
east of the Mississippi were more or less agricultural. 
They all raised corn, beans, squashes and melons." — 
Some Considerations on the Mounds, p. 70. And Brinton 
states that the Algonkins, according to the early writers, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



305 



cultivated "large fields of maize, squash and tobacco;" 
that the Cherokees, "when they were upon the Kanawha 
and Ohio, had large fields under cultivation;" and that, 
according to De Soto's historians, the Chata Muskokis 
had "extensive fields of maize, beans, squashes and 
tobacco." Nothing more can be said for the agricultural 
pursuits of the Mound Builders, and when we come to 
consider that they raised identically the same kinds of 
grain and vegetables, we must conclude that they were 
one and the same people. 

The theory that the American Indians have always 
been a nomadic or roving race, too falls to the ground 
before a painstaking investigation. "History also bears 
us out," says Thomas, "in the assertion that at the time 
of the discovery nine-tenths of the tribes in the mound 
district had fixed seats and local habitations, depending 
to a great extent for sustenance upon the cultivation of 
the soil." — Ohio Mounds, p. 9. This can be said of the 
Hurons, Iroquois, Cherokees, Lenapes, Creeks, Mandans 
and many other tribes. 

What has been presented in this section of the present 
chapter will certainly convince the reader that the Mound 
Builders not only possessed a degree of culture no higher 
than that of many of the Indian tribes at the time of the 
Discovery, but also that in its main features it was iden- 
tical with the culture of these Indian tribes. And this 
explodes the theory of the Mormons that they were civ- 
ilized and enlightened Jaredites and Nephites. 

Moorehead, in the following extract from his "Primi- 
tive Man in Ohio," pp. 200, 201, sums up all that the 
Mound Builder of Ohio was capable of. "First, he 
excelled in building earthen fortifications and in the 
interment of his dead; second, he made surprisingly long 
journeys for mica, copper, lead, shells and other foreign 



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CUMORAH REVISITED 



substances to be used as tools and ornaments; third, he 
was an adept in the chase and in war ; fourth, he chipped 
flint and made carvings on bone, stone and slate exceed- 
ingly well, when we consider the primitive tools he em- 
ployed; fifth, a few of the more skillful men of his tribe 
made fairly good representations of animals, birds and 
human figures in stone. This sums up, in brief, all that 
he seemed capable of, which we in our day can consider 
remarkable. On the other hand, he failed to grasp the 
idea of communication by written characters, the use of 
metal (except in the cold state), the cutting of stone or 
the making of brick for building purposes, and the con- 
struction of permanent homes. Ideas of transportation, 
other than upon his own back, or in frail canoes, or the 
use of coal, which was so abundant about him, and which 
he frequently made into pendants and ornaments, and a 
thousand other things which civilized beings enjoy, were 
utterly beyond his comprehension. Instead of living 
peacefully .in villages and improving a country un- 
equaled in natural resources, of which he was the sole 
possessor, he spent his time in petty warfare, or in sav- 
age worship, and in the observance of the grossest super- 
stitions. He possessed no knowledge of surgery or the 
setting of bones, unless we accept as evidence two neatly 
knitted bones found at Fosters', which by some extra 
effort he may have accomplished. But, while admitting 
these two specimens to be actually and carefully set with 
splints, we have scores of femora, humeri and other 
bones from Fort Ancient and Oregonia which are worn 
flat against unnatural sockets, formed after the bones 
had been displaced. We have broken fibulas and tibiae 
which had never been reset. They were bent like a bow, 
and nature alone had aided them in coming together." 
Reader, does this look very much as if the Mound 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Builders were the Jaredites and Nephites, or that there 
was in ancient times in the United States "a wonderful 
civilization" which "had its base and origin in Central 
America and Mexico"? Does it not look as if the people 
who built the mounds were, after all, only red Indians 
and not civilized Cushites from Babel or Jews from 
Jerusalem? The more the remains of the Mound Build- 
ers are studied, the farther do archaeologists get away 
from the old notion that they represent a civilization that 
is vanished and a race that is extinct. 1 

1 The earthworks differ less in kind than in degree from other remains 
respecting which history has not been entirely silent. — Haven. 

There is nothing indeed in the magnitude and structure of our 
western mounds which a semi-hunter and semi-agricultural population, like 
that which may be ascribed to the ancestors or Indian predecessors of 
the existing race, could not have executed. — Schoolcraft. 

No doubt that they were erected by the forefathers of the present 
Indians. — Cass. 

All these works — and I am inclined to assert the same of the whole 
of those in the Atlantic States and the majority in the Mississippi Valley 
— were the production, not of some mythical tribe of high civilization in 
remote antiquity, but of the identical nations found by the whites residing 
in these regions.- — Brinton. 

Nothing in them which may not have been performed by a savage 
people. — Gallatin. 

The old idea that the mound builders were peoples distinct from and 
other than the Indians of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and their 
progenitors, appears unfounded in fact and fanciful. — C. C. Jones. 

Mound-builders were tribes of American Indians of the same race 
with the tribes now living. — Force. 

The progress of discovery seems constantly to diminish the dis- 
tinction between the ancient and modern races; and it may not be very 
wide of the truth to assert that they were the same people. — Lapham. 

There is no more occasion for assuming a mysterious race of 
"Mound Builders" in America than for assuming a mysterious race of 
"Castle Builders" in England. — Fiske. 

In view of these results, and of the additional fact that these same 
Indians are the only people, except the whites, who, so far as we know, 
have ever held the region over which these works are scattered, it is be- 
lieved that we are fully justified in claiming that the . mounds and in- 
cisures of Ohio, like those in New York and the Gulf States, were the 
work of the red Indians of historic times, or of their immediate an- 
cestors. — Carr. 

For a long time these aboriginal monuments were esteemed sufficient 
evidence to prove that the country had been inhabited by a peculiar race, 



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CU 310 RAH REVISITED 



THE MOUND BUILDERS WERE NEITHER JAREDITES NOR 
NEPHITES, BUT "LAMANITES." 

This chapter would not be complete if I did not bring 
before the reader more of the historical and traditional 
evidences by which the American Indians and the Mound 
Builders are identified as one people. 

I begin with the historical evidences of mound-build- 
ing in that region which, at the time of the Discovery, 

to which the name of "Mound-Builders" was given. We now know that 
these works were constructed by the immediate ancestors of our American 
Indians, and that, indeed, in the more southern parts of the Mississippi 
valley, as, for instance, in northern Mississippi, the people had not quite 
abandoned the mound-building habit when they came in contact with the 
whites. — Slialcr. 

For a long time it was believed by a great many persons, scientific 
and otherwise, that these piles of earth, often called pyramids quite er- 
roneously, could not have been made by ordinary Amerinds, but as the 
study of the native American proceeded and the data of what he did and 
does actually do began to be recorded, it was perfectly plain that it was 
not at all necessary to look beyond the "Indian" for the origin of the 
mounds — that is, beyond the "Indian" as he was known in the region 
where the mounds occur. It was found that he had erected mounds after 
the arrival of the whites, and if he built one or several he might have 
built all.- — Dellcnbaugh. 

Nothing yet discovered proves for any of the Mound-Builders a 
higher intellectual capacity than is, or was, possessed by more than one 
well-known tribe of American Indians. — Fowke. 

What, it may be asked, are we to believe was the character of the 
race to which for the purpose of clearness we have for the time being 
applied the term "Mound-Builders" ? The answer must be, they were no 
more nor less than the immediate predecessors in blood and culture of 
the Indians described by De Soto's chronicler and other early explorers, 
the Indians who inhabited the region of the mounds at the time of their 
discovery by civilized men. — Nadaillac. 

The researches of Thomas and others have shown that the artificial 
mounds and other earthworks of the Mississippi Valley are in no way 
different from earth-structures sometimes seen in process of erection by 
early explorers, and contain no artifact types distinct from those found in 
use among the Indians (except beads of Venetian glass, hawk bells of al- 
loyed metal, and other objects of European origin found in a few of the 
tumuli) ; accordingly it has been made clear that these structures are not the 
work of ancient peoples of high culture as once supposed, but of Indians 
corresponding in culture and habit to those found in the region by the 
settlers. — International Year Book, 1898. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



309 



was mainly inhabited by tribes of the Ghata Muskoki 
family, and which comprises the present States of South 
Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi and 
Louisiana. 

The first white men to visit this section of the New 
World were De Soto and his army of six hundred choice 
men, who, in their search for gold, crossed it in the years 
1540 and 1 54 1. This expedition had with it a number of 
chroniclers or historians who have left us accounts of its 
trials and privations, the country through which it passed 
and the character of the tribes inhabiting it. Of the 
chroniclers of this expedition there are three whose 
works have come down to us, Biedma, Garcilasso de la 
Vega and the Gentleman of Elvas. The accounts of 
mound-building among the tribes of the section through 
which this expedition passed as given by these writers 
are as follows : 

"The caciques of this country make a custom of rais- 
ing near their dwellings very high hills, on which they 
sometimes build their houses." — Biedma, Hist. Coll. La., 
Vol. II., p. 105. 

"The town and the house of the Cacique Ossachile 
are like those of the other caciques in Florida. . . . The 
Indians try to place their villages on elevated sites ; but 
inasmuch as in Florida there are not many sites of this 
kind where they can conveniently build, they erect eleva- 
tions themselves in the following manner : They select 
the spot and carry there a quantity of earth which they 
form into a kind of platform two or three pikes in 
height, the summit of which is large enough to give 
room for twelve, fifteen or twenty houses, to lodge the 
cacique and his attendants. At the foot of this elevation 
they mark out a square place according to the size of the 
village, around which the leading men have their houses. 



3io 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



. . . To ascend the elevation they have a straight passage- 
way from bottom to top, fifteen or twenty feet wide. 
Here steps are made by massive beams, and others are 
planted firmly in the ground to serve as walls. On all 
other sides of the platform the sides are cut steep." — 
Garcilasso de la Vega, Hist, de la Flor., Lib. II., Chap. 
XXII. 

''The chief's house stood near the beach upon a very 
high mount made by hand for defense." — Gentleman of 
Elvas, Bradford Club Series, Vol. V., p. 23. 

These mounds are identical in size and shape with the 
so-called "temple mounds" of Squier and Davis. 

One hundred and thirty years after De Soto's expedi- 
tion the French began the settlement of Louisiana. At 
that time these tribes had not yet given up the custom of 
mound-building, for a number of early French writers 
mention the practice. 

M. de la Harpe says: "The cabins of the Yasous, 
Courous, Offogoula and Ouspie are dispersed over the 
country on mounds of earth made with their own hands." 
— Annals of Louisiana Hist. Coll., p. 196. 

Pericault, in 1704, said of them: "The houses of the 
suns (chiefs) are built upon mounds and are distin- 
guished from each other by their size. . The mound upon 
which the house of the great chief or sun is built is 
larger than the rest, and the sides of it steeper." 

Du Pratz, who spent twenty years among the Natchez, 
wrote as follows in 1720: "As I was an intimate friend 
to the sovereign of the Natchez, he showed me their 
temple, which was about thirty feet square, and stands 
upon an artificial mound about eight feet high by the 
side of a small river (St. Catherine). The mound slopes 
insensibly from the main front, which is northwards, but 
on the other sides it is somewhat steeper. ' 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



311 



Others of the French who have mentioned the fact 
of mound-building by the historic southern tribes are 
De Tonti, St. Cosme, De la Source, Joutel, Cravier and 
La Petit. 

The Cherokees also were Mound Builders. Bartram, 
speaking of their ancient town of Stricoe, says: "On 
these towering hills appeared the ruins of the ancient 
famous town of Stricoe. Here was a vast Indian mount 
or tumulus and great terrace, on which stood the 
council house, with banks encompassing their circuit; 
here were also old peach and plum orchards; some of 
the trees appeared yet thriving and fruitful." — Bartram, 
P- 343- 

In 1765 Lieut. Henry Timberlake drew a map of a 
portion of the Cherokee country and located their "over- 
hill towns," those in the valley of the Little Tennessee. 
The location of these towns upon Timberlake's map 
agrees exactly with the location of the various mound 
groups of that section upon the map of the Geological 
Survey of the National Bureau. Mound Group No. 1, 
on the latter map, is located where Timberlake locates 
the Cherokee town of "Mialoqu \ No. 2 is identified 
with "Tuskegee ;" No. 3, with "Tommotley ;" No. 4, with 
"Toqua;" No. 5, with "Tennessee ;" No. 6, with "Chote ;" 
No. 7, with "Settacoo;" No. 8, with "Halfway Town;" 
No. 9, with "Chillowey," and No. 10, with "Tellassee.'' 
Who can say, in the face of this, that the Cherokee^ were 
not Mound Builders ? 1 

As still further confirmatory of the theory that the 
Cherokees were Mound Builders, we have the various 
works of art from the mounds which are identical with 
the works of art of this tribe. Among these are the 



1 "Cherokees in Pre-Columbian Times," p. 32. 



312 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



so-called "Monitor" pipe and the shell gorgets with 
engravings upon them. 

The "Monitor" pipe was made of soapstone with a 
flat base, two or three inches long and perhaps one 
broad, from the middle of which rose the bowl, often 
carved into the shape of a bird, animal or human head. 
Because of its general resemblance to the ironclad "Mon- 
itor" it has been given its name. These pipes formed no 
uncommon part of the Mound Builders' possessions, and 
are found throughout the entire mound territory. But 



to Adair, the Cherokees made pipes of precisely this 
pattern, as he says 'the forepart of each commonly runs 
out with a sharp peak, two or three fingers broad and a 
quarter of an inch thick, on both sides of the bowl 
lengthwise ; they cut several pictures with a great deal of 
skill and labour.' This seems not only to connect the 
builders of these typical Ohio works with the Indians, 
thus presenting a difficult problem for the advocates of 
the above theory to solve, but forms another strong link 
in the chain of Cherokee history we are trying to fol- 
low." — Cherokees in Pre-Columbian Times, p. 73. 





MONITOR PIPES. 



just such pipes were 
made and used by the 
Cherokees within his- 
t o r i c times. "The 
'Monitor' pipe, or pipe 
with broad base run- 
ning out in front and 
behind the bowl, is 
considered typical of 
the people who built 
the 'sacrificial mounds' 
and 'sacred enclosures' 
of Ohio ; yet, according 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



313 



The shell gorgets taken from the mounds have vari- 
ous designs carved upon them, such as crosses, half 
moons, stars, faces and serpents. There is no doubt that 
these are the work of the ancient inhabitants, yet just 
such ornaments were made and worn by the Cherokees 
and other tribes after the occupancy of the mound terri- 
tory by the whites ; and this identifies the American In- 
dians with the Mound Builders. Lawson, who traveled 
in North Carolina in 1700, says that "the Indians often- 
times make of a cer- 
tain large sea-shell a 
sort of gorge, which 
they wear about their 
neck in a string, so it 
hangs on their collar, 
whereon is some- 
times engraven a 
cross or some odd 
sort of figure which 
comes next in their 
fancy." - — Cherokees, 
p. 26. 

The "Monitor" 
pipes and the shell gorgets plainly identify the Cherokees 
with the Mound Builders. 

Passing to the State of New York, we have the con- 
cession that the mounds of that State were the work of 
the Iroquoian tribes. Baldwin, a most zealous advocate 
of the opposite theory, says : "It has heretofore been 
stated that remains of this people" — Mound Builders — 
"exist in western New York, but a more intelligent and 
careful examination shows that the works in western 
New York are not remains of the Mound Builders. This 
is now the opinion of Mr. Squier, formed on personal 




314 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



investigation since the great work of Squier and Davis 
was published." — Ancient America, p. 32. This is an 
important concession. Colden, who wrote in 1750, states 
that the tribes of that State, after the corpse had been 
placed in a round hole in the ground, raised "the earth 
in a round hill over it." 

Other tribes have also built mounds in very recent 
times. Lewis and Clark make mention of the erection 
of a large burial-mound on the bluffs of the Missouri in 
1802. Beck's "Gazeteer for Illinois and Missouri," 1821, 
speaks of the erection of an immense memorial earth- 
work over the mortal remains of an Osage chief. And 
a group of fifteen mounds near Ottumwa, Iowa, were 
thrown up to cover the dead slain in a battle between the 
indomitable Black Hawk, and his Sacs and Foxes, and a 
force of Omahas little more than seventy-five years ago; 
while near Eldon, of the same State, there is a group of 
seven others which cover a band of dead Iowas slain in 
a battle with the same chief. 1 

The Algonkins also built mounds. Brinton states : 
"The neighbors of the Iroquois, the various Algonkin 
tribes, were occasionally constructors of mounds. In 
comparatively recent times we have a description of a 
Victory mound' raised by the Chippeways after a suc- 
cessful encounter with the Sioux." — Essays of an Ameri- 
canist, p. 70. 

And it is to tribes of this stock, mainly, that the stone 
graves are to be attributed. "The Kickapoos living in 
southern Illinois, and the Shawnees, who dwelt near 
Nashville, buried their dead, until quite recent times, in 
stone graves." — Prehistoric America, p. 188. 

We come now to the State of Ohio, which bears 

1 "The Mound-building Age in America." 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



315 



evidence of supporting a denser Mound Builder popula- 
tion than any other State, perhaps, in the Union. The 
mounds and inclosures of this section were, most of 
them, erected before the Columbian epoch, and even 
among those who hold to their Indian origin there is a 
difference of opinion as to which tribe, or tribes, to 
assign them. Dr. Brinton early advanced the theory that 
their builders were the ancestors of the Chata Muskoki 
tribes, who, after their dispersion, moved farther south. 
But in later years the learned Doctor seemed disposed to 
modify this theory somewhat, so as to divide the honor 
between the Muskoki tribes and the Cherokees. 1 

Professor Thomas is of the opinion that the earth- 
works of that State were the joint work of the Chero- 
kees, Shawnees and some few other Indian tribes, and 
this seems to agree best with the facts as they have been 
brought out by traditional, historical and archaeological 
researches. 

It has been ascertained that the State was anciently 
inhabited by two hostile, savage tribes, the dolicocephali 
of the Muskingum Valley and the brachycephali of the 
valleys of the Miami and the Scioto. These tribes were 
the Ohio Mound Builders. The attempt has been made 
to trace a connection between them and historic tribes, 
and a few clues have been found which seem to indicate 
that the long-heads were the Cherokees and the short- 
heads the Lenapes and Hurons. The stock which for- 
merly inhabited the valleys of the Miami and the Scioto 
bore unmistakable osteological affinities to the stone- 
grave people of Tennessee, and, as the Shawnees who 
inhabited that State buried their dead in stone graves, it 
is inferred that they were one with its ancient inhabitants 

1 "Essays of an Americanist," p. 82. ' 



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CUMORAH REVISITED 



and also of the same race with the ancient inhabitants of 
the Miami and Scioto Valleys, as they, too, buried their 
dead in the same kind of sepulchres. Therefore Pro- 
fessor Thomas concludes that both Fort Ancient and 
Fort Hill were erected by this tribe. 

The evidence connecting the Cherokees with the other 
stock is very strong. According- to the Delaware tradi- 
tion, obtained by Heckewelder, the Delawares (who were 
originally one with the Shawnees and Mohicans) came 
from the far western part of the continent. After a 
very long journey they arrived at the river called the 
Naemaesi Sipu, where they met the Mengwe, or Hurons, 
who had also left their old country for a new. The 
Lenape spies, who had been sent ahead, returned from 
the land beyond the river and reported that the country 
was inhabited by a very powerful and industrious people 
called by themselves Talligeu, or Tallegwi, who had reg- 
ular fortifications and intrenchments. The Lenape, after 
hearing this report, sent a messenger to the Tallegwi 
requesting permission to settle in their country. This 
was promptly refused, but they were given permission to 
pass through and seek a home to the eastward. After 
the messenger returned, the Lenape made preparations 
and began to cross the river, when the Tallegwi treacher- 
ously fell upon them, slew a great number and drove the 
rest back. Fired at this treachery, they called a council 
of their chief men to decide upon what was best to be 
done, to retreat as cowards or to fight it out as men. At 
this juncture the Mengwe, who had heretofore taken no 
part in the matter, offered to join them, upon condition 
that they would divide the country with them after it had 
been conquered. The proposal was gladly accepted, and 



1 "Cherokees in Pre-Columbian Times," p. 79. 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



317 



the two joined forces against the original inhabitants. 
The war, which was long and bloody, resulted favorably 
to the allies, and the Tallegwi were driven from the land 
and were forced to flee toward the south, while the 
victors divided the land between them, the Mengwe tak- 
ing the northern part along the lakes and the Lenape the 
southern part along the Ohio River. 

That the Tallegwi were the Mound Builders there 
seems to be no reasonable doubt, and some have seen in 
them, at their expulsion, the migrating Toltecan hordes 
pouring down from the regions of the north into Mex- 
ico. But later students have generally given up this 
theory, and many, for several reasons, identify them 
with the Cherokees, who at the time of the early settle- 
ment of the country were living in Tennessee, North 
Carolina and adjacent territory. 

One of the most weighty reasons for connecting the 
Tallegwi with the Cherokees is their name. The former 
are variously called in the traditions Allegewi, Talle- 
gewi, Tallegwi, Tallegeu and Tallike. The Cherokees 
were first called "Chelaques" and "Achelaques" by 
the historians of De Soto's expedition. The French called 
them "Cheraqui." And the name as we have it was first 
used in 1708. The name that they give themselves is 
"Tsalagi" in their Middle and Western dialects and 
"Tsaragi" in their Eastern. The reader will observe that 
there is close agreement in sound between Tallike, the 
name of the ancient Mound Builders of Ohio, and 
Tsalagi, the name that the Cherokees give themselves. 
"Name, location and legends," says Brinton, "combine to 
identify the Cherokees or Tsalaki with the Tallike; and 
this is as much evidence as we can expect to produce in 
such researches."' — Walam Olum, p. 231. 

Another reason for identifying the Tallike with the 



3i8 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Cherokees is that their language points to the north for 
its derivation; it is an offshoot of the language of the 
Huron-Iroquois stock. "Linguistically," says Mooney, 
"the Cherokee belong to the Iroquoian stock, the rela- 
tionship having been suspected by Barton over a century 
ago, and by Gallatin and Hale at a later period, and 
definitely established by Hewitt in 1887. While there 
can now be no question of the connection, the marked 
lexical and grammatical differences indicate that the 
separation must have occurred at a very early period."' — ■ 
Nineteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American 
Ethnology, p. 16. 

We have already seen that the Cherokees were 
Mound Builders and that they claimed to have built the 
mounds on Grave Creek, West Virginia, which include 
one of the largest burial-mounds in the country, whose 
dimensions are one thousand feet in circumference by 
seventy-five feet high. The traditions of other tribes sus- 
tain this tradition. Mooney says of the Wyandots : "The 
Wyandot confirm the Delaware story and fix the identifi- 
cation of the expelled tribe. According to their tradition, 
as narrated in 1802, the ancient fortifications in the Ohio 
Valley had been erected in the course of a long war 
between themselves and the Cherokees, which resulted 
finally in the defeat of the latter." — Ibid, p. 19. 

And Prof. John Fiske writes: "The Cherokees were 
formerly classed in the Muskoki group, along with the 
Creeks and Choctaws, but a closer study of their lan- 
guage seems to show that they were a somewhat remote 
offshoot of the Huron-Iroquois stock. For a long time 
they occupied the country between the Ohio River and 
the Great Lakes, and probably built the mounds that are 
still to be seen there. Somewhere about the thirteenth 
or fourteenth century they were gradually pushed south- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



319 



ward into the Muskoki region by repeated attacks from 
the Lenape and Hurons. The Cherokees were probably 
also the builders of the mounds of eastern Tennessee 
and western North Carolina. They retained their mound- 
building habits sometime after the white man came upon 
the scene." — The Discovery of America, Vol. I., p. 145. 

From the foregoing facts it seems highly probable 
that the Cherokees were the Tallegwi, and that they, with 
the Lenapes and Hurons, were the Mound Builders of 
Ohio. 

Thomas attributes the mounds of the various sections » 
of the United States to the Indian tribes as follows: 
"The proof is apparently conclusive that the Cherokee 
were mound builders, and that to them are to be attrib- 
uted most of the mounds of east Tennessee and western 
North Carolina ; it also renders it probable that they 
were the authors of the ancient works of the Kanawha 
Valley in West Virginia. There are also strong indica- 
tions that the Tallegwi of tradition were Cherokee and 
the authors of some of the principal works of Ohio. The 
proof is equally conclusive that to the Shawnee are to be 
attributed the box-shaped stone graves, and the mounds 
and other works directly connected with them, in the 
region south of the Ohio, especially those of Kentucky, 
Tennessee and northern Georgia, and possibly also some 
of the mounds and stone graves in the vicinity of Cin- 
cinnati. The stone graves in the valley of the Delaware 
and most of those in Ohio are attributable to the Dela- 
ware Indians. There are sufficient reasons for believing 
that the ancient works in northern Mississippi were built 
chiefly by the Chickasaw ; those in the region of Flint 
River, southern Georgia, by the Uchee ; and that a large 
portion of those of the Gulf States were built by the 
Muskokee tribes. The evidence obtained is rendering it 



320 



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quite probable that the Winnebago were formerly mound 
builders and the authors not only of burial tumuli, but 
also of some of those strange works known as 'effigy 
mounds,' so common in Wisconsin. That most of the 
ancient works of New York must be attributed to the 
Iroquois tribes is now generally conceded." — Work in 
Mound Exploration, p. 13. 

Now, to sum up : The Mound Builders were not the 
Jaredites and Nephites, because they were one people, 
were divided into numerous independent tribes, came 
from the north or northwest, began and ended their 
work too late, were of an inferior culture, and are identi- 
fied with existing tribes by traditional, historical and 
archaeological evidences. The theory of the Book of 
Mormon, then, that the United States was the seat, in 
ancient times, of a "wonderful civilization" which "had 
its base and origin in Central America and Mexico," is 
wholly a creation of the fancy and unsupported by the 
facts. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



321 



CHAPTER VII. 

The Civilization of Ancient America Neither Jareditic nor 
Nephitic — The Origin of American Civilization — The An- 
tiquity of American Civilization — Certain Features of Ameri- 
can Civilization Which Plainly Oppose the Book of Mormon. 

America presents a broad and fertile field of research 
to the archaeologist. Indeed, nowhere else in the entire 
world can be found remains which furnish more material 
for study than do those on the western continent. In the 
Mississippi Valley we have the interesting memorials of 
the Mound Builders ; in the southwestern part of the 
United States are to be seen the deserted habitations of 
the Cliff Dwellers ; in Mexico and Central America are 
found the ruined temples of the Nahuas and Mayas; and 
in Peru loom up before the traveler and explorer the 
crumbling edifices of the Incas and their predecessors. 
Hundreds of the works in these sections have been 
explored and have been described in books on American 
archaeology, yet much of the mystery which has shrouded 
them remains, and, so far as we can see, ever will remain. 

The origin of the civilization, or civilizations, that 
built the prehistoric American cities is a question that 
has provoked much discussion among Americanists. Its 
simplest answer has generally been rejected, and in its 
place have been substituted the wildest and most un- 
reasonable hypotheses. It has seemed very much easier 
for most reasoners to attribute the origin of aboriginal 
culture to a foreign source than to conceive of its native 
development. In later years, however, views on this 
question have been changing, until to-day antiquarians 



322 



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are coming to look upon it in its true light as an indig- 
enous product ; and, I venture to say, few now believe 
that any of the works of aboriginal art were above the 
ability of the more-advanced tribes, the Aztecs, Mayas 
and Peruvians, who dwelt in the regions where these 
antiquities abound at the time of the Discovery. 

When speaking of the ancient inhabitants of Mexico, 
Central America and Peru as being "civilized," let it be 
understood that this term is employed in a relative and 
not in an absolute sense ; for, strictly speaking, no nation 
in America had ever progressed beyond the middle status 
of barbarism, the smelting of iron ore being wholly un- 
known to them. 1 When compared with the savage tribes 
around them, however, they may be said to have attained 
to a certain degree of civilization, their works indicating 
a stage of culture at least one step in advance of the 
tribes of the other parts of the continent. 

Throughout the New World the people were fetich 
and sun worshipers, animists and polytheists. In Peru 
and Tezcuco it is claimed, however, some of the more 
intelligent of the natives broke away from the prevailing 
sun-worship and adored an incorporeal deity. The origi- 
nal words for God in the American tongues do not 
express the idea of personality, but, simply, the super- 
natural in general, the mysterious and unknown. The 
practice of offering human sacrifices was observed among 
all the civilized nations, though to a very limited extent 
in Peru. In both Mexico and Central America such sac- 
rifices were often devoured in religious feasts. The 
number four was to all American religions what the 
number seven is to the Jewish. The gentile system pre- 
vailed and most of the tribes reckoned descent in the 



1 Morgan's "Ancient Society," pp. 9-12, 



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323 



female line. Practically all forms of primitive govern- 
ment were to be found, from the most absolute despotism 
to the lowest form of democracy. The Isthmus of Pan- 
ama divided the continent into two grand divisions in 
respect to its native architecture : north of the Isthmus 
the habit prevailed of erecting large structures on pyra- 
midal bases ; south of the Isthmus the pyramid as a foun- 
dation for buildings is seldom, if ever, seen. The Mound 
Builders used no cement or cut stone ; the Peruvians, 
Mayas, Mexicans and Cliff Dwellers employed both. But 
little sculpturing was done in Peru; it appears in pro- 
fusion on the mural remains of Central America; the 
sculpture work of the Mound Builders consisted in the 
manufacture of pipes into imitations of birds, beasts and 
the human figure and the carving of slate and shells. In 
hieroglyphical writing the Mayas took the lead, followed 
by the Mexicans ; the hieroglyphics of the Mound Build- 
ers, Cliff Dwellers and Peruvians were only pictographs, 
while among the last-named communications were car- 
ried on by means of variously-colored and knotted cords 
called quipos. All of the American nations manufac- 
tured pottery, and in some sections the art was carried to 
a high point of excellence. Iron was unknown among 
the tribes except in its crude state, in which it was made 
into ornaments by a process of grinding and rubbing. 
Bronze was manufactured by the Mexicans and Peru- 
vians, but was unknown to the Mayas. In Mexico and 
Central America the volcanic glass, obsidian, was made 
into cutting tools. Gold, silver and copper were worked 
into ornaments of a high grade of finish in Mexico, 
Central America and Peru, where the art of smelting 
was understood; the Cliff Dwellers and Mound Builders 
worked these metals in their cold state. Cloth, in Peru, 
was made from cotton and the wool of the llama and 



324 



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vicuna ; in Mexico and Central America from cotton, and 
in Xorth America from cotton, hemp, hair and bird 
feathers. In all parts maize was the staple article of 
food, taking the place in the New World that rice fills 
among the inhabitants of eastern Asia. In different parts 
of the continent tobacco, melons, squashes, beans, pep- 
pers and potatoes were grown. The Cliff Dwellers, Mex- 
icans and Peruvians irrigated their fields with artificial 
ditches. The less-advanced tribes reckoned, as do all 
savage people, by moons, seasons and years, but among 
the Mexicans, Central Americans, Muyscas and Peru- 
vians we find artificial calendar systems. [Mummification, 
by different methods, was practiced in some parts, though 
the bodies found, in most instances, were preserved by 
the antiseptic properties in the soil or by the coldness 
and dryness of the climate. Throughout Xorth America 
the tribes used the frail canoe, but the [Mayas made boats 
that were seaworthy and would carry as many as fifty 
persons and kept up a commerce with neighboring tribes. 
The languages of America are multitudinous, there being 
1 80 linguistic stocks on the continent. In structure, with 
a possible exception or two, they are polysynthetic and 
possess certain features by which they are distinguished 
from the tongues of all the rest of the world. The 
Americans had no domestic animals but a wolfish kind 
of dog, and, among the Peruvians, the llama, which was 
highly prized for its hair, for food and for carrying 
burdens. This sums up, in brief, the things of which the 
more advanced of the ancient Americans were capable. 

Just how far the culture of each of the sections 
mentioned influenced the culture of the others is hard 
to say. It seems certain that the Peruvians and Central 
Americans exerted no influence upon each other after 
they began to build those monuments which still remain ; 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



325 



what contact they had before none can tell. On Peru- 
vian architecture and the features in which it differed 
from that of the Mayas and Mexicans, Brinton says: 

"Peruvian architecture was peculiar and imposing. It 
showed no trace of an inspiration from Yucatan or 
Mexico. Its special features were cyclopean walls of 
huge stones fitted together without mortar; structures of 
several stories in height, not erected upon tumuli or 
pyramids ; the doors narrowing in breadth toward the 
top; the absence of pillars or arches; the avoidance of 
exterior and mural decoration ; the artistic disposition of 
niches in the walls, and the extreme solidity of the foun- 
dations. These points show that Inca architecture was 
not derived from that north of the Isthmus of Panama. 
In the decorative effects of the art they were deficient; 
neither their sculpture in stone nor their mural paintings 
at all equaled those of Yucatan." — The American Race, 
p. 213. 

These points of dissimilarity will also apply with 
equal force against the contention that the civilization of 
Central America came from Peru. 

In South America the culture of but one nation, the 
Muyscas, bore any marked affinities to that of the people 
on or north of the Isthmus. Affinities in art work have 
been traced between this people and the Chiriquians 
dwelling on the Isthmus, and consist in certain like fea- 
tures in articles of stone, pottery and gold. Brinton 
remarks : "Very slight connection has been shown be- 
tween the civilization of North and South America, and 
that only near the Isthmus of Panama." — Myths of the 
New World, p. 43. 

In North America the evidences of contact between 
the various civilized tribes are most marked. The Mayas 
and Nahuas, and the Zapotecs who dwelt between them, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



erected colossal buildings upon pyramidal foundations, 
and the pyramid, as a basis for such structures, is trace- 
able northward into the Mississippi Valley. Hence it is 
probable that the art germ in all these sections had a 
common source which is to be sought for somewhere in 
North America. As the traditions of the Mayas, Nahuas 
and Zapotecs, as well as those of the mound-building 
tribes of the Mississippi Valley, pointed to the north or 
west as the directions from which they originally came, 
it makes it certain that we must look to some locality 
between the Great Lakes and the Pacific as the point 
where they received their first impressions of that culture 
which they developed in those regions where they after- 
wards dwelt. The point of divergence for all these races 
Brinton would locate south of the receding glacial ice- 
sheet, north of the Gulf of Mexico and east of the Rocky 
Mountains; while Gibbs looked upon the region between 
the Puget Sound and Cape Spencer as an area from 
which human swarms might have issued forth j 1 but the 
exact locality will undoubtedly always remain unknown. 

With these introductory remarks I pass on to show 
that the civilization of ancient America differed both in 
kind and in degree from that described in the Book of 
Mormon. 

THE ORIGIN OF ABORIGINAL AMERICAN CIVILIZATION. 

With respect to the origin of ancient American civil- 
ization, the Book of Mormon teaches that it came from 
two countries, at two consecutive times, and was derived 
from three nations or peoples. That of the Jaredites, 
which Apostle Kelley asserts was Cushite civilization, 2 
was brought from Babel ; while that of the Nephites, 

1 "Third Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 151. 
8 "Presidency and Priesthood," Chapter XI. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



which all Mormons contend was Jewish with a few 
Egyptia : features intermingled, was brought from Jeru- 
salem. 

i. Did ancient American civilization come from the 
Tower of Babel? 

As proof that the first civilized people came from the 
Tower of Babel, we are referred to the flood myths that 
are so common among American tribes. "The Book of 
Mormon statement that a colony came from the Tower 
of Babel," says Elder Phillips, "not only agrees with 
Gen. 11:9, but also with the traditions had by the Ameri- 
can aborigines." — Book of Mormon Verified, p. 2. And 
Apostle Kelley declares that "this position is supported 
by the scientific findings made in Central America, re- 
vealing traditions of Noah, the flood, the ark and the 
creation of the world." — Presidency and Priesthood, p. 
268. 

The following flood and migration myths, taken from 
Short's "North Americans of Antiquity," are given by 
Elder Etzenhouser in his "Book Unsealed," pp. 4-7, to 
prove this theory: 

"Adair, the expert, and Emanuel De Moraes agree 
that the Quiches by tradition affirm that they made a 
long journey by land and crossed the sea from the east. 
The tradition of their origin states that they came from 
the far east across immense tracts of land and water." 

"He" — De la Vega — "fails to give any definite infor- 
mation from the document" — one of the old books of 
Central America — "except the most general statements 
with reference to Votan's place in the calendar, and his 
having seen the Tower of Babel, at which each people 
was given a new language." 

"It is found in the history of the Toltecs that this 
age and first world, as they call it, lasted 1,716 years; 



328 



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that men were destroyed by tremendous rains and light- 
nings from the sky, and even all the land, without the 
exception of anything, and the highest mountains, were 
covered up and submerged in water . . . fifteen cubits 
. . . and how after men multiplied they erected a very 
high . . . tower ... in order to take refuge in it, should 
the second world (age) be destroyed. Presently the lan- 
guage was confused, and, not able to understand each 
other, they went to different parts of the earth. The 
Toltecs, consisting of seven friends and their wives, who 
understood the same language, came to these parts, . . . 
520 years after the flood." 

"That all the natives" — of Mexico — "came from 
seven caves, and that these seven caves are the seven 
ships or galleys in which the first populators of the land 
came. This people came in quest of the terrestrial para- 
dise, and were known by the name of Tamoanchan, by 
which they mean, 'We seek our home.' " This tradition 
is made to harmonize with the coming of the Jaredites 
by the supposition that they came to the New World in 
seven of their eight barges, the remaining one carrying 
their stores and provisions 

After giving these, and several other like accounts, 
Mr. Etzenhouser remarks : "All of the above citations 
are very confirmatory of the account cited in the Book 
of Mormon, respecting the migration of the Jaredites to 
the western continent." 

But the migration of the Jaredites from Babel is not 
proved by the American flood myths for at least three 
important reasons. In the first place, those which more 
closely agree with the account in Genesis are known to be 
either partly or wholly spurious, the work of the early 
missionaries or native converts, who seemed to think it 
their bounden duty to make the mythology of the Ameri- 



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329 



can tribes to conform to their own religious opinions. In 
the second place, it is impossible to determine whether 
those flood myths, about whose authenticity there can be 
no doubt, relate to a universal flood, or to a flood, or 
floods, purely local (but universal so far as the knowledge 
of the tribes possessing them went), or to any real flood 
at all. And, in the third place, all these flood myths, with 
probably not an exception, make the tribes who dwelt 
here in the sixteenth century the direct descendants of 
those who escaped the cataclysm instead of the descend- 
ants of a later colony as the Book of Mormon declares. 

The deluge legends of America, with many another 
of the myths ascribed to the early inhabitants, should be 
cautiously received. Many of them have come down to 
us through the hands of men who have not scrupled to 
tamper with them to make them agree with the Catholic 
faith. Thus we have in the mythology of Central Amer- 
ica and Mexico not only traditions of a deluge, a Tower 
of Babel and a scattering of tribes similar, even in detail, 
to the account of Moses in the Book of Genesis, but we 
also have such features of the Christian faith as the 
birth, sufferings, death, detention and ascension of Christ 
in the experiences of some of the gods of those countries. 
A careful study of these myths has revealed the fact that 
these analogies to the Christian religion are either false 
deductions from the myths themselves, or else they are 
interpolations. Bancroft says on the flood myths of Cen- 
tral America and Mexico : "This I may say first, how- 
ever; some of them are doubtless spurious, and few have 
escaped the renovating touch of the Spanish priests and 
chroniclers, who throughout their writings seem to think 
it their bounden duty to make the ideas and history of 
the New World correspond to those of the Old." — Native 
Races, Vol. V., p. 12. 



330 



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As an example of this, we may take the Toltec myth 
given above. This myth can be traced no further back 
than to the time of Ixtlilxochitl, a native convert to the 
Catholic faith. Inspired with his new religion he sought 
zealously to make that of his fathers conform to it, with 
the consequence that he took with native mythology cer- 
tain inexcusable liberties. The reader will only have to 
compare his with the flood myths about whose authen- 
ticity there is no doubt, to detect that the depth of the 
water, the erection of the tower and the confusion of 
tongues are all fabrications from the Book of Genesis. 1 

Even the commonly-received flood myths of Mexico 
are of doubtful authenticity. According to one of them, 
the only persons who escaped the deluge were Coxcox 
and his wife Xochiquetzal. These saved themselves in 
the hollow trunk of a bald cypress. When the waters 
had assuaged they grounded their ark upon the summit 
of Mount Colhuacan. Here they increased and multi- 
plied, but their children were all born dumb, and re- 
mained so until they were taught innumerable languages 
by a dove. Fifteen of these children, who understood 
the same language, or related languages, were the an- 
cestors of the Toltecs, Aztecs and Alcolhuas. 

Bancroft says of this myth: "A careful comparison 
of the passages given above will show that this whole 
story of the escape of Coxcox and his wife in a boat 
from a great deluge, and of the distribution by a bird of 
different languages to their descendants, rests on the 
interpretation of certain Aztec paintings, containing sup- 
posed pictures of a flood, of Coxcox and his wife, of a 
canoe or rude vessel of some kind, of the mountain Cul- 
huacan, which was the Mexican Ararat, and of a bird 

1 "Prehistoric America," pp. 272, 273. 



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331 



distributing languages to a number of men. Not one of 
the earliest writers on Mexican mythology, none of those 
personally familiar with the natives and with their oral 
traditions as existing at the time of or immediately after 
the Conquest, seems to have known this legend ; Olmos, 
Sahagun, Motolinia, Mendieta, Ixtlilxochitl and Camargo 
are all of them silent with regard to it. These facts must 
give rise to grave suspicions with regard to the accuracy 
of the commonly accepted version, notwithstanding its 
apparently implicit reception up to this time by the most 
critical historians. These suspicions will not be lessened 
by the result of the researches of Don Jose Fernando 
Ramirez, conservator of the Mexican National Museum, 
a gentleman not less remarkable for his familiarity with 
the language and antiquities of Mexico than for the 
moderation and calmness of his critical judgments, so 
far as these are known." — Native Races, Vol. III., p. 68. 

Following this statement, Bancroft gives this gentle- 
man's discussion and interpretation of these paintings, 
according to which, instead of recording a history of the 
escape of a people from an universal deluge, they simply 
describe, pictographically, the wanderings of the Mexi- 
can tribes among the lakes of their country, their journey 
beginning at a place "not more than nine miles from the 
gutters of Mexico" ! 1 

Similar to the account of the escape of Coxcox and 
his wife is that of the escape of Tezpi, given in a tradi- 
tion from Michoacan. This character is represented as 
saving himself, his wife and children and a number of 
animals in a spacious vessel. When the waters began to 
go down he sent out from his ark a vulture, who fed on 
the carcasses of the dead and did not return. He then 



"Myths of the New World," pp. 240, 241. 



332 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



sent out a humming-bird, which returned bringing a num- 
ber of green leaves, by which Tezpi knew that the waters 
had begun to subside. He, too, landed his ark on the 
summit of Mount Colhuacan. Bancroft says on this 
legend : "We have also read the reputed Tarasco legend 
of Tezpi, which so closely resembles the Biblical legend 
of the deluge that it can not be discussed as a native 
tradition at all, but must be regarded simply as the 
invention of some Spanish writer who thought it his 
mission to show that the Hebrew traditions were familiar 
to the Americans." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 13. 

But there are certain American flood myths about 
whose authenticity there can be no question. They are 
found among the Athapascas, Algonkins, Iroquois, 
Cherokees, Chickasaws, Caddoes, Natchez, Dakotas, 
Pueblos, Aztecs, Miztecs, Muyscas, Mayas, Quiches, 
Quichuas and many other tribes. 1 These flood myths 
are distinguished, however, by characteristics so peculiar 
and features so unique as to make it wholly uncertain 
whether they refer to the flood, a flood or to any real 
flood at all. It should not surprise us if they are proved 
to be purely mythical, or, at best, if they refer only to 
local occurrences. The uncertainty as to what conclu- 
sion we are to draw from them will be seen in the fol- 
lowing myths. 

According to a Peruvian myth, a shepherd was one 
day tending his flock of llamas. Noticing that their 
countenances were sad, and that they spent the night 
in watching the stars, he questioned them concerning 
the cause of the same. They replied that they had seen 
six stars massed together in the heavens, and that this 
was the sign of a universal flood, which was about to 



1 "Nineteenth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 445. 



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333 



occur, and advised him, in order to escape, to take refuge 
on some high mountain. Taking their advice, he gath- 
ered his flocks and family together and proceeded to the 
summit of Mount Ancasmarca, where, when the flood 
came, he was safe from destruction. 1 

According to another Peruvian tradition, only two 
brothers were saved from the flood, and that by taking 
refuge on a high mountain which floated upon the 
waters. After the flood had subsided they, having eaten 
up all their food, went down into the valley for more. 
Upon their return to the mountain they found, to their 
surprise, that food had already been prepared for them 
by unknown hands. Curious to know who their bene- 
factors were, they agreed that while one went down into 
the valley the other should keep watch. Soon after the 
one chosen to go had departed the one who was left 
behind saw two aras with the faces of women preparing 
their food. But these, becoming aware of his presence, 
fled. Giving chase, he soon captured one of them, who 
became his wife. From this union sprang the tribe of 
the Canaris. 2 

According to the Cherokee flood myth, the Cherokee 
Noah was warned of the coming of the flood or freshet 
by the barking of a dog, and saved himself and his 
family on a raft. 3 

In the Algonkin tradition there were no antediluvians 
and no family which escaped the flood, but after the 
waters had subsided the earth was peopled by Michabo, 
their spirit of the dawn.* 

With the Dakotas no one escaped the deluge, and 

1 Bancroft, V: 14. 

2 Bancroft, V: 15. 

3 "Nineteenth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 261. 
* "Myths," p. 235. 



334 



CUM ORAM REVISITED 



this was also the belief of the Nicaraguans and the 
Botocudos of Brazil. 1 

The myth of the Ascochimi of California tells us that 
no one escaped the flood, but that after the waters had 
assuaged the Coyote planted the feathers of various 
kinds of birds from which sprang the various races of 
men. 2 

And, according to the Navajos and a tradition of the 
Aztecs, the antediluvians were changed into birds, and 
so escaped the cataclysm. 3 

The peculiarities of these myths, both in general form 
and detail, make it wholly impossible, though their au- 
thenticity is not questioned, to prove that they relate to 
the great deluge described by Moses ; indeed, it is far 
more probable that these accounts are either wholly 
mythical, or else that they have been suggested by local 
inundations. Such floods are common in the American 
river valleys and could not have failed to make a deep 
impression on the uncultivated minds affected by them. 
This, after all, may be the true explanation of the flood 
myths so common among American tribes.* 

But, even if it were true that some of the flood myths 
of America relate to the Biblical deluge, they, with hardly 
a variation, present one feature which puts them in direct 
opposition to the account of the migration of the Jared- 
ites as given in the Book of Mormon. According to the 
Book of Mormon, the people who came here from Babel 
were all destroyed about 600 B. C, with the exception of 
two men, Coriantumr and Ether, and what became of 
them we are not informed; according to these myths the 

1 "Myths," p. 235. 

2 "Myths," p. 235. 

3 "Myths," p. 240. 

* "North Americans of Yesterday," p. 407. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



335 



people who escaped the flood were not destroyed, but 
continued down to the discovery of the continent in 1492. 

Thus, the Quiche myth given by Mr. Etzenhouser 
has the ancestors of that tribe come across great tracts 
of land and water from the East. Now, if the Book of 
Mormon is true, there was not a tribe living on the 
continent when it was discovered by Columbus, whose 
ancestors came direct from the Tower of Babel, so the 
ancestors of the Quiches could not have been the Jared- 
ites, and this tradition does not prove what Elder Etzen- 
houser would like to have us believe. 

Ixtlilxochitl's Toltec tradition also would not prove 
what Mormon writers tell us, even if its authenticity 
were undoubtedly established, for it makes the Toltecs 
come to America 520 years after the flood, and we know 
that they were here as late as the tenth century A. D. 
On the contrary, Mr. Stebbins and others try to make us 
believe that the Toltecs were the Nephites, who did not 
come from the Tower of Babel at all. 

The Tzendal tradition of Votan and his coming also 
fails, and for the same reason, for the Votanese were not 
exterminated six centuries before Christ, but continued 
down to the time of the Discovery and are represented 
to-day by tke Mayas of Yucatan. 

And the people who came from the "seven caves" 
were not all exterminated before the beginning of our 
era, but were the ancestors of the historic Maya and 
Nahua tribes of Central America and Mexico. 

As these myths make the tribes who dwelt here in 
1492 the direct descendants of those who are said to have 
escaped from the flood or floods, they oppose, rather 
than sustain, the Book of Mormon claim that the first 
inhabitants of the New World were the Jaredites, who 
were exterminated 600 B. C. : 



336 



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2. Did Ancient American Civilisation Come from 
Palestine? 

The Book of Mormon asserts that temples and syna- 
gogues, similar to those of Palestine, were erected by the 
Nephites in both South and North America. No sooner 
had they become settled in Peru, we are told, than they 
built a temple like the temple of Solomon. "And I, 
Nephi, did build a temple ; and I did construct it after 
the manner of the temple of Solomon, save it were not 
built of so many precious things: for they were not to 
be found upon the land; wherefore, it could not have 
been built like unto Solomon's temple. But the manner 
of construction was like unto the temple of Solomon; 
and the workmanship thereof was exceeding fine." — 2 
Nephi, 4:3. And, after the Nephites had spread into 
the land northward, we are told further they built "tem- 
ples," "synagogues" and "sanctuaries." 

But, turning to the monuments of the country, we 
find nothing to sustain the theory that a Jewish civiliza- 
tion once existed on the American continent. The an- 
cient Americans built large and imposing structures, but 
their architectural types were peculiar to themselves, 
very different from the architectural types of the ancient 
nations of the Old World. "There is nothing in any of 
the remains, so far developed," says Dellenbaugh, "that 
indicates foreign influence, prior to the Discovery. Every 
architectural work on the continent is purely Amerindian 
or modified by contact with other races subsequent to 
1492." — North Americans of Yesterday, p. 247. 

The Jews were not adepts in architecture. With 
them building "was always kept within the limits of a 
mechanical craft, and never rose to the rank of a fine 
art." When they returned from Egyptian captivity they 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



337 



occupied the houses of the former inhabitants of Pales- 
tine, and, afterwards, whenever they attempted anything 
in the line of architecture on a grand scale, as in the case 
of David's palace and Solomon's temple, they employed 
Phoenician artists. On account of the decadence of their 
remains little is known of the architecture of their 
earlier days. There is sufficient evidence on hand, how- 
ever, Biblical and archaeological, for us to say that ordi- 
narily the structures were of stone or sun-dried brick, 
and that they were erected with the design of utility and 
not beauty. In later times the chief distinguishing fea- 
tures of their dwelling-houses were plain, bare walls, 
sometimes rising to two or more stories in height; flat 
roofs ; apartments arranged around a court or around 
courts ; small windows which mostly faced the interior 
courts, and usually low doors which swung in sockets. 

While in general principles all buildings are con- 
structed alike, there is nothing specifically Jewish about 
American architecture, nor anything that would indicate 
that the culture of ancient America had been influenced 
by Jewish ideas. 

Brinton sums up the chief features of Peruvian 
architecture as "cyclopean walls fitted together without 
mortar; structures of several stories in height, not 
erected upon tumuli or pyramids ; the doors narrowing 
in breadth toward the top; the absence of pillars or 
arches ; the avoidance of exterior and mural decoration ; 
the artistic disposition of niches in the walls, and the 
extreme solidity of the foundations." 

None of these features are specifically Jewish, while 
many of them are strikingly un- Jewish. The Jews fitted 
together the stones of their buildings with mortar ; the 
Peruvians laid theirs up without, although they used a 
very hard stucco with which to plaster the outside. The 



338 



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roofs of Palestine were flat; those of Peru were bell- 
shaped. 1 The door of the Jewish house was rectangu- 
lar in shape; that of the Peruvians was wider at the 
bottom than at the top. And the Jews, without doubt, 
understood the principle of the arch, while "the Peru- 
vian architects were wholly unacquainted with the true 
principle of the circular arch reposing on its keystone." 
— Conquest of Peru, Vol. I., p. 96. 

Here, then, in a section of America where, above all 
other sections, we should find evidences of the Jewish 
civilization of the ancient inhabitants, we find a number 
of fundamental architectural features that are strikingly 
un- Jewish. 

Passing into Central America and Mexico we find as 
great a lack of Jewish architectural features as in Peru. 
The temples of these countries were as different from 
the temple of Solomon and the Jewish synagogues as a 
lighthouse is from the Mosque of Omar. 

First, the temples of this region differed from the 
Jewish temple in position. They were built upon arti- 
ficial, truncated pyramids whose sides were faced with 
stone slabs and whose summits were reached by flights 
of stone steps. 

Second, they differed from it in arrangement. The 
Jewish temple had its courts, its holy place and its holy 
of holies, but no such arrangement appears in the tem- 
ples of Yucatan and Mexico. The ground plans of Jew- 
ish and American temples were entirely different. 

Third, they differed from it in adornment. The 
Yucatec and Mexican temples were often adorned with 
the most hideous, heathenish, grotesque and obscene 
devices. Besides, their walls were often inscribed with 



1 "Conquest of Peru," Vol. I., p. 95. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



339 



hieroglyphics so different from Hebrew characters as in 
themselves to nullify the theory that these structures 




FIGURE ii. 

i GROUND PLAN "TEMPLE OF THE THREE TABLETS." 
2. GROUND PLAN "TEMPLE OF THE SUN." PALENQUE. 



were reared by a people whose ancestors had come from 
the Holy Land. 

And, fourth, they differed from it in design, being 
the shrines of heathen gods and the places where human, 



340 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



not animal, sacrifices were offered up, as is evidenced by 
the shape of the altars found in or near them. 

It would be impossible to conceive of structures more 
different from one another in arrangement, adornment, 
construction and design than those of Central America 
and Mexico and Palestine. 

Moving up into the Mississippi Valley, we still look 
in vain for evidences of a prehistoric Jewish civilization. 
The Mound Builders used perishable materials entirely 
in the construction of their buildings, cut stone and 
mortar being wholly unknown to them. They erected 
their structures upon great piles of earth. They worked 
their metals in a cold state and did not know how to 
manufacture iron and steel tools. They had no beasts of 
burden. They knew nothing of the Oriental cereals, and 
they had no system of hieroglyphical writing. 

These facts plainly refute the Book of Mormon 
claim that a civilization of Jewish origin, planted in 
Peru, spread throughout both Americas in ancient times. 

3. Did Ancient American Civilization Come from 
Egypt? 

The Book of Mormon asserts that the ancient Ameri- 
cans employed a system of writing known among them as 
the "Reformed Egyptian," and in support of this certain 
resemblances in the arts and customs of the American 
tribes to those of Egypt are presented. 

Apostle W. W. Blair writes : "The ancient Nephites 
and Zarahemlaites were, no doubt, not only acquainted 
with the language, but also with much about the habits, 
customs, arts and sciences peculiar to Egypt ; for the 
Israelites, in all their history from Abraham to King 
Zedekiah, and afterwards, had direct and intimate inter- 
course with the Egyptians. Therefore it is not strange 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



34i 



that we find in Mexico and Peru, as stated by Mr. Dela- 
field, these evidences of Egyptian art and manners, espe- 
cially that of hieroglyphic writing. In conclusion upon 
this point we have only to say that the claim of the Book 
of Mormon that the ancient inhabitants of America were 
skilled in Egyptian language, is now fully vindicated. 
And here we have another unanswerable proof of the 
truth of that book." — Joseph the Seer, p. 162. 

But Mr. Blair, who, at the time this was written, was 
one of the chief polemics in the Reorganized Mormon 
Church, and who was a writer of more than ordinary 
ability, falls into the grievous error, altogether too 
common among Mormon writers, of following an in- 
vestigator whose theory hardly outlived his day. This 
investigator is Mr. John Delafield, whose work, "An 
Inquiry into the Origin of the Antiquities of America," 
was published in Cincinnati in 1839. 

While it is true that in some respects the culture of 
the ancient Americans was like that of Egypt, it is 
equally true that in others it was like that of China, 
Polynesia, India, Phoenicia and Greece, and, if this 
proves that it was derived from one, it proves that it 
was derived from all these nations. In citing analogies 
as the proof of a theory plenty of room must be allowed 
for accident and human instinct. Indeed, it is difficult 
to understand how, on natural grounds, the American 
nations could have avoided living in some respects like 
the other nations of the world, unless they had not lived 
at all. Men build shelters for themselves, and do hun- 
dreds of other things by instinct, and a likeness in these 
respects can not prove relationship. It is only when the 
resemblances pointed out are numerous and striking that 
they deserve serious attention. And right here is where 
the evidences presented by Delafield and Blair fail. They 



342 



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are neither more numerous nor more striking than those 
presented to prove the Mongolian, Polynesian or Phoeni- 
cian derivation theories. On the Egyptian analogies 
cited Bancroft remarks: "Few of these analogies will, 
however, bear close investigation, and even where they 
will they can hardly be said to prove anything." — Native 
Races, Vol. V., p. 55. 

Delafield arranges the various Egyptian analogies 
under seven heads, as follows : 

"I. Philological. The various analogies in language. 

"II. Anatomical. The peculiar craniological forma- 
tion common to those countries, as asserted by Dr. 
Warren. 

"III. Mythological. The existence of two peculiar 
modes of worship, addressed to two deities ; one san- 
guinary, the other peaceful. . . . 

"IV. Hieroglyphic. The use of three peculiar systems 
of hieroglyphic writing of the Egyptians. 

"V. Astronomical. 1. Identity in the division of the 
year, month and week, and the calculations thereof. 2. 
Identity in the use of intercalary days. 3. Identity in 
zodiacal signs. 

"VI. Architectural. 1. Identity in sepulchral tumuli 
(mounds for burial). 2. Identity in pyramidal temples. 
3. In the uses of these temples. 4. In the mechanical 
power which enabled them to move masses that no other 
races have ever accomplished. 5. Their use of hiero- 
glyphic sculpture on all their sacred buildings. 6. Simi- 
larity in zodiacal and planispheric carvings. 7. Identity 
in sepulchral ornaments. 

"VII. Identity in practice of embalming and preser- 
vation of the royal corpses." Quoted in "Joseph the 
Seer," p. 162. 

Mr. Blair employs this quotation to prove one thing: 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



343 



That the ancient Americans were familiar with, and 
practiced, some of the arts of ancient Egypt. The 
people themselves, he tells us, came from Jerusalem and 
were of the stock of Abraham. Let us now take up these 
analogies, one by one, and examine them for the purpose 
of ascertaining just how far they go to prove his theory. 

I. We begin with the supposed analogies between the 
spoken languages of America and Egypt. These have 
proved to Delafield that ancient American culture was 
influenced by Egyptian civilization, just as similar anal- 
ogies have proved to Adair that the American Indians 
came originally from Palestine, and to Lang that they 
came from Polynesia. But in both their grammatical 
structure and etymology the American languages differ 
widely from the Egyptian. The fact that such competent 
philologists as Duponceau, Gallatin, Hayden, Brinton 
and Powell, men whose scholarship and competency can 
not be questioned, throw overboard all such theories is 
a sufficient answer to the absurd claim of Apostle Blair 
that "the ancient inhabitants of America were skilled in 
Egyptian language." These authorities tell us that our 
native tongues all bear the indisputable stamp of indig- 
enousness. Duponceau, as early as 1819, declared that 
the American grammatical forms "differ essentially from 
those of the ancient and modern languages of the old 
hemisphere." Gallatin says that "they bear the impress 
of primitive languages, and assumed their form from 
natural causes, and afford no proof of their being de- 
rived from a nation in a more advanced state of civiliza- 
tion." Hayden tells us that "no theories of derivation 
from the Old World have stood the test of grammatical 
construction." Brinton states that their common charac- 
teristics are "sufficient to place them in a linguistic class 
by themselves." And Powell declares that "the Indian 



344 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



tongues belong to a very low type of organization." As 
the Egyptian was an advanced form of speech, it may 
be said without reserve that the American tongues were 
not derived from it. Apostle Blair's witness, Delafield, 
is a theorist with but a poor reputation as an authority ; 
Duponceau, Gallatin, Hayden, Brinton and Powell, on 
the contrary, are acknowledged authorities on the sub- 
ject of American philology. 

2. The anatomical similarity cited proves nothing in 
regard to the origin of ancient American civilization, 
and, as Mr. Blair and his church contend that the ancient 
Americans were of Jewish descent, if it were established 
it would act rather as an argument against than an argu- 
ment for the book that he seeks to prove divine. It may 
be well to say, however, that American craniology offers 
no support whatever to any of the derivation theories, 
for, instead of there being only one type of skull on the 
continent, we find many types, so that while the crania 
of one locality might approximate to the Egyptian type, 
the crania of another locality might approximate to the 
German type. Moorehead tells us that the crania of 
Ohio are, in some instances, as wide apart as the Cauca- 
sian and the Ethiopian. 

3. The mythological similarity mentioned is also cer- 
tainly erroneous. I have failed to find that either the 
Egyptians or the Americans had just "two peculiar 
modes of worship, addressed to two deities; one san- 
guinary, the other peaceful." While it is true that among 
the Aztecs a god of war was worshiped, I do not believe 
that any one of the gods of ancient Egypt was exclu- 
sively a god of war. The gods and goddesses worshiped 
at Memphis were Ptah, "Father of the Beginning;" 
Pakht, the cat-headed goddess ; Nefer Atum, son of 
Ptah and sun of the underworld; Seb, god of earth and 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



345 



vegetation; Nut, wife of Seb ; Osiris, son of Seb, the 
good principle; Isis, wife of Osiris; Horus, the strong 
young sun of the day; Athor ; Set, the principle of phy- 
sical and moral darkness; Nephthys, goddess of the 
dead; Apis, the sacred bull ; Serapis ; Ra, the "victorious 
principle of light, life and right;" Mentu, Ra as the 
rising sun ; Atmu, Ra as the setting sun ; and Shu, the 
solar light. Those of Thebes were Amnion, the god of 
productivity; Mut, goddess of womanhood; Khuns, son 
of Ammon and Mut and divinity of the moon; Neph, 
soul of the universe ; Khem, the energizing principle of 
physical life; Neith, mother of the sun; Mat, goddess of 
truth; Thoth, the moon-god; and Anubis, the guide of 
ghosts. (Gayley's "Classic Myths," pp. 504, 505.) All 
these gods and goddesses received adoration in their 
particular cities, and it is certainly erroneous to claim 
that in Egypt there were just two modes of worship 
addressed to two deities, one sanguinary and the other 
"peaceful." This claim is likewise unsupported in Amer- 
ica. The less-advanced tribes knew no such" distinction 
in their worship, their gods being gods of war on one 
occasion and gods of peace on another. If such a dis- 
tinction existed, we certainly should find it in Mexico, 
but even there it does not appear. The Aztecs wor- 
shiped Tezcatlipoca, their chief divinity; Quetzalcoatl, 
their god of the air; Tlaloc, their god of rain; Huitzilo- 
pochtli, their terrible god of war; Xuihtecutli, their god 
of fire ; Mixcoatl, their god of hunting and thunder, and 
hundreds of lesser divinities. It has been believed by 
some that they worshiped an invisible god, Teotl, but 
this is denied by others, and Brinton declares that this 
term only expresses in its most general form the idea of 
the supernatural. It appears upon comparison that the 
religious system of America was very much inferior to 



34<5 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



that of Egypt. Nadaillac states that the polytheism 
which existed in America was "a very inferior polythe- 
ism ... to that, for instance, which history records 
among the Egyptians or the Greeks." While Gallatin 
says that "viewed only as a development of the intellec- 
tual faculties of man, it is, in every respect, vastly in- 
ferior to the religious systems of Egypt, India, Greece 
or Scandinavia." But just how it would help the case 
of Mr. Blair, even if it were proved that the ancient 
Americans and the ancient Egyptians had two such 
modes of worship, he does not make plain. The Book 
of Mormon does not inform us that the Nephites prac- 
ticed any of the distinctive ceremonies or held any of the 
distinctive beliefs of the Egyptian religion, but asserts 
that at first they were Jews and afterwards Christians. 
So, if it should be shown that in their religion the 
ancient Americans were similar to the people of ancient 
Egypt, it would prove that the Book of Mormon is false 
in its teachings on this point. 

4. The hieroglyphics, next, claim our attention. Mr. 
Blair says : "Now when we find by testimony outside of 
the Book of Mormon that the ancient inhabitants of 
America possessed a knowledge of Egyptian hieroglyph- 
ics and sculpturing and architecture, we have another 
strong evidence of the divinity of that book." — Joseph 
the Seer, p. 161. But where does he find this evidence? 
In Delafield's book. And Bancroft, speaking of this 
author's evidence adduced in support of the assertion 
that the ancient Americans used Egyptian hieroglyphics, 
says : "Delafield, it is true, discerns a distinct analogy 
between the hieroglyphs of Egypt and America. And 
the evidence he adduces is absurd enough." — Native 
Races, Vol. V., p. 61. There is one fact that disproves 
this theory : No Egyptologist has ever been able to trans- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



347 



late the inscriptions on the monuments of America; they 
are a sealed book and can not be opened by the same key 
that has unlocked the literary treasures of ancient Egypt. 
To prove that the hieroglyphics of America and Egypt 
are entirely distinct from each other, I submit the fol- 
lowing quotations from authorities on the question. 

"If there were any hope of evidence that the civilized 
peoples of America were descendants, or derived any of 
their culture from the ancient Egyptians, we might 
surely look for such proof in their hieroglyphics. Yet 
we look in vain. To the most expert decipherer of 
Egyptian hieroglyphics, the inscriptions at Palenque are 
a blank and unreadable mystery, and they will perhaps 
ever remain so." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 61. 

"The two countries were entirely different ... in 
their written characters." — Ancient America, p. 183. 

"The hieroglyphics are too few on American build- 
ings to authorize any decisive inference. On comparing 
them, however, with those of the Dresden codex, prob- 
ably from this same quarter of the country, with those 
on the monuments of Xochicalco, and with the ruder 
picture-writing of the Aztecs, it is not easy to discern 
anything which indicates a common system. Still less 
obvious is the resemblance to the Egyptian characters, 
whose refined and delicate abbreviations approach al- 
most to the simplicity of an alphabet." — Conquest of 
Mexico, Vol. III., pp. 409, 410. 

"Notwithstanding the oft-repeated assertion that a 
resemblance between Egyptian and Maya hieroglyphics 
exists, no one of the Egyptologists so successful in their 
chosen field has been able to decipher the Maya writ- 
ing." — North Americans of Antiquity, p. 418. 

"So far as now" — 1900 A. D. — "understood, there is 
no relationship between any kind of Amerindian writing 



348 



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and that of other races. Like everything else pertaining 
to the Amerind people, the development appears to have 
been purely indigenous." — North Americans of Yester- 
day, p. 80. 

In the light of the facts brought out in these quota- 
tions, it appears that the claim that the ancient Ameri- 
cans used "Reformed Egyptian" will not stand before 
archaeological research. 

5. The assertion that the Egyptians and the Ameri- 
cans were alike in their astronomical systems is also false. 
Delafield tells us that this likeness consisted in: "1. Iden- 
tity in the division of the year, month and week, and the 
calculations thereof. 2. Identity in the use of intercalary 
days. 3. Identity in zodiacal signs." But a brief com- 
parison of the calendar systems of the two countries will 
show that there is little upon which to base his claim. 

The Egyptian day began at midnight and was com- 
posed of twenty-four hours. Their week, according to 
Dio Cassius, began on Saturday. Their months were 
lunar months of thirty days each. Twelve of these with 
five supplementary days added made a vague year. As 
a quarter of a day was lost each year, the reckoning went 
back a day every four years, which resulted in a revolu- 
tion of the seasons in every 1,461 years. 1 Their solar 
year began with the autumnal equinox. 2 

On the method of computing time among the Peru- 
vians, Prescott writes: 'They divided the year into 
twelve lunar months, each of which, having its own 
name, was distinguished bv its appropriate festival. 
They had also weeks ; but of what length, whether of 
seven, nine or ten days, is uncertain. As their lunar year . 
would necessarily fall short of the true time, they rec- 



1 "Encyclopedia Britannica," article "Calendar." 

2 "International Encyclopedia," article "Calendar." 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



349 



tified their calendar by solar observations made by means 
of a number of cylindrical columns raised on the high 
lands round Cuzco, which served them for taking azi- 
muths ; and, by measuring their shadows, they ascer- 
tained the exact times of the solstices. . . . The year 
itself took its departure from the date of the winter 
solstice." — Conquest of Peru, Vol. L, p. 77. 

The only similarity here to the Egyptian system is in 
the lunar month, and this proves nothing, as all unciv- 
ilized men have reckoned by this division of time. Let 
the reader observe that while the solar year of the Egyp- 
tians began at the autumnal equinox, the year of the 
Peruvians began at the winter solstice. 

Among the Aztecs the day was divided into four 
parts, morning, noon, evening and midnight; five days 
composed a week, the last day of which was devoted to 
marketing and pleasure; four weeks made a month; 
eighteen months, plus five intercalary days, made a civil 
year; thirteen civil years composed a "knot;" four 
"knots" made a "cycle;" and two "cycles" an "age" of 
104 years. At the end of each cycle of fifty-two years 
thirteen days were added to make up for the one-quarter 
day lost each year. Just when the year began is not 
certain, as authorities differ, giving January 9 ; February 
1, 2, 24 and 26; March 1 and April 1 as the Aztec new 
year. The five intercalary days that were added each 
year were called nemontemi, or unlucky days, and chil- 
dren born and enterprises undertaken upon them were 
considered unlucky. The Aztecs had also a ritual calen- 
dar, of which Bancroft says: "The year contained as 
many days as the solar calendar, but they were divided 
into entirely different periods. Thus, in reality there 
were no months at all, but only twenty weeks of thirteen 
days each ; and these not constituting a full year, the 



350 



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same kind of reckoning was continued for 105 days 
more, and at the end of a tlalpilli" — their "knot" or 
period of fifty-two years — "thirteen days were inter- 
calated to make up for the lost days." — Native Races, 
Vol. II., p. 515. 

The Maya year was practically the same as the Mexi- 
can, differing from it only in its names. It consisted of 
eighteen months of twenty days each and began on a 
date corresponding to our July 16. Besides this manner 
of reckoning time, the Mayas had another, according to 
which their year was divided into twenty-eight periods 
of thirteen days each. 

Among the Muyscas the day was divided into four 
parts, three days made a week, ten weeks a lunation or 
suna, twelve sunas composed a rural year, twenty sunas 
a civil year and thirty-seven sunas a ritual year. 

The reader, by comparing the calendar systems of 
Egypt and America, will discover that they are unlike in 
so many particulars and alike in so few that the asser- 
tion that that of the latter country was derived from that 
of the former can not be credited. The only similarities 
that are sufficiently pronounced to attract attention are 
the lunar months observed by the Egyptians and the 
tribes of America and the practice of the intercalation 
of five days on to the end of the twelve lunar months to 
make the year 365 days long. Yet, as there are so many 
discrepancies between the two systems, and as these 
points of similarity can be satisfactorily explained on 
natural grounds, it is absurd to try to prove by them 
that the culture of ancient America was derived in part 
from Egypt. 

Delafield claims, further, that there is an identity in 
the zodiacal signs of the two countries. But this is also 
false. The zodiacal signs of Egypt were twelve in num- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



351 



ber: the Fleece, two Sprouting Plants, the Beetle, the 
Knife, the Mountain of the Sun, the Serpent, the Arrow, 
the Mirror, Water, the Bull, the Virgin and the Fishes. 
The day signs of the Aztecs were twenty in number: 
the Swordfish, the Wind, the House, the Lizard, the 
Snake, Death, the Deer, the Rabbit, W r ater, the Dog, the 
Monkey, Brushwood, the Cane, the Tiger, the Eagle, the 
Vulture, Movement, the Flint, Rain and the Flower. 1 
Of these signs but two can truthfully be said to be 
common to both countries. They are the Serpent and 
Water. The Sprouting Plant of Egypt may faintly sug- 
gest the Cane of America and the Arrow the Flint. It 
is doubtful whether the Mexican sign, interpreted to be 
the Swordfish, was intended for that monster or for 
some other ; it certainly bears no resemblance to a fish, 
therefore none to the sign Fishes of the Egyptian zodiac. 
The rest of the signs are entirely different. There is a 
closer correspondence between the zodiacal signs of east- 
ern Asia and those of America than there is between 
those of Egypt and America. The "Britannica Encyclo- 
pedia" (Art. "Zodiac") says: "A large detachment of 
the 'cyclical animals' even found its way to the New 
World. Seven of the twenty clays constituting the Aztec 
month bore names evidently borrowed from those of the 
Chinese horary signs. The Hare (or Rabbit), Monkey, 
Dog and Serpent reappeared without change ; for the 
Tiger, Crocodile and Hen, unknown in America, the 
Ocelot, Lizard and Eagle were substituted as analogous." 
So, if a similarity of zodiacal signs proves anything, it 
proves that the Aztec civilization came from China in 
place of Egypt. 

6. It is asserted that the architecture of America cor- 

1 "Encyclopedia Britannica," article "Zodiac." 



352 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



responded to that of Egypt in certain particulars. These 
are stated by Delafield as: "i. Identity in sepulchral 
tumuli (mounds for burial). 2. Identity in pyramidal 
temples. 3. In the uses of these temples. 4. In the 
mechanical power which enabled them to move masses 
that no other races have ever accomplished. 5. Their 
use of hieroglyphic sculpture on all their sacred build- 
ings. 6. Similarity in zodiacal and planispheric carvings. 
7. Identity in sepulchral ornaments." 

Without comment I put in opposition to this sum- 
mary of architectural analogies the following quotations 
from other and better authorities : 

"The Palenque architecture has little to remind us of 
the Egyptian or the Oriental." — Conquest of Mexico, 
Vol. III., p. 407. 

"It may be, as he" — De Bourbourg — "says, that for 
every pyramid in Egypt there are a thousand in Mexico 
and Central America, but the ruins in Egypt and those 
in America have nothing in common. The two countries 
were entirely different in their language, in their styles 
of architecture, in their written characters, and in the 
physical characteristics of their earliest people, as they 
are seen sculptured or painted on the monuments. An 
Egyptian pyramid is no more the same thing as a Mexi- 
can pyramid than a Chinese pagoda is the same thing as 
an English lighthouse. It was not made in the same 
way, nor for the same uses. The ruined monuments 
show, in generals and in particulars, that the original 
civilizers in America were profoundly different from the 
ancient Egyptians. The two peoples can not explain 
each other." — Ancient America, p. 183. 

"There are those who, in the truncated pyramids, see 
evidences of Egyptian origin. The pyramids, like the 
temple mounds, were used for sepulchres; but here the 



t 



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353 



analogy ends. The Mound Builders burned the bodies 
of the dead, or left them to be resolved into dust by the 
slow process of decay; but the Egyptians, believing that 
the soul would again tenant the body, resorted to expen- 
sive processes for its preservation. The same remarks 
will apply when we institute a comparison between the 
Teocallis of Central America and the pyramids. They 
differ both in the mode of construction and the object 
aimed at. The pyramids are complete in themselves, and 
as they tower up in the Nile Valley, the eye at once takes 
in the coherence of the several parts. The Teocallis form 
but a part of the general plan ; they were but the founda- 
tions for more elaborate structures. 'There is no pyra- 
mid in Egypt,' says Stevens, 'with a palace or temple 
upon it ; there is no pyramidal structure in this country 
(Central America) without.' The pyramids, according 
to Herodotus, were originally coated with stone from 
base to summit; the Teocallis have flattened summits, 
with flights of steps descending to the base." — Prehis- 
toric Races, p. 187. 

"In its general features, American architecture does 
not offer any strong resemblances to the Egyptian." — 
Native Races, Vol. V., p. 59. 

"It" — the great mound at Cholula — "has been called 
a pyramid, with other mounds in Mexico and Central 
America, but this is not a proper term for these Amer- 
indian works. They have not the character of the 
Egyptian pyramids, nor were they constructed with the 
same object. The pyramids were tombs, while the large 
Amerind mounds were foundations for buildings." — 
North Americans of Yesterday, p. 351. 

On the similarities and dissimilarities of Egyptian 
and American sculpture work Bancroft remarks: "Be- 
tween American and Egyptian sculpture there is, at first 



354 



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sight, a very striking general, resemblance. This, how- 
ever, almost entirely disappears upon close examination 
and comparison. Both peoples represented the human 
figure in profile, the Egyptians invariably, the Americans 
generally; in the sculpture of both, much the same atti- 
tudes of the body predominate, and these are but awk- 
wardly designed ; there is a general resemblance between 
the lofty headdresses worn by the various figures, though 
in detail there is little agreement. These are the points 
of analogy and they are sufficiently prominent to account 
for the idea of resemblance which has been so often and 
so strongly expressed. But while sculpture in Egypt is 
for the most part in intaglio, in America it is usually in 
relief. In the former country the faces are expression- 
less, always of the same type, and, though executed in 
profile, the full eye is placed on the side of the head; in 
the New World, on the contrary, we meet with many 
types of countenance, some of which are by no means 
lacking in expression." — Native Races, Vol. V., pp. 60, 
61. 

It will be observed from these quotations that there 
is very little in either American architecture or sculpture 
to suggest the theory that the ancient Americans were 
familiar with the arts and customs of ancient Egypt. 

7. The practice of embalmment is mentioned by Dela- 
field as still further proof of the Egyptian origin of 
ancient American civilization. 

The following description of the Egyptian mode is 
given in the "Encyclopedia Britannica" (Art. "Embalm- 
ing") : "In that country certain classes of the community 
were specially appointed for the practice of the art. The 
brains were in part removed through the nostrils by 
means of a bent iron implement, and in part by the 
injection of drugs. The intestines having been drawn 



CUMORAH REVISITED 355 

out through an incision in the left side, the abdomen was 
cleansed with palm-wine, and filled with myrrh, cassia, 
and other materials, and the opening was sewed up. This 
done, the body was steeped several days in a solution of 
litron or natron. Diodorus relates that the cutter ap- 
pointed to make the incision in the flank for the removal 
of the intestines, as soon as he had performed his office, 
was pursued with stones and curses by those about him, 
it being held by the Egyptians a detestable thing to 
commit any violence or inflict a wound on the body. 
After the steeping, the body was washed, and handed 
over to the swathers, a peculiar class of the lowest order 
of priests, called by Plutarch cholchytoe, by whom it was 
bandaged in gummed cloth; it was then ready for the 
coffin. Mummies thus prepared were considered to rep- 
resent Osiris. In another method of embalming, costing 
twenty-two minae (about $450), the abdomen was in- 
jected with 'cedar-tree pitch,' which, as it would seem 
from Pliny, was the liquid distillate of the pitch-pine. 
This is stated by Herodotus to have had a corrosive and 
solvent action on the viscera. After injection the body 
was steeped a certain number of days in natron; the 
contents of the abdomen were allowed to escape, and the 
process was then complete. The preparation of the 
bodies of the poorest consisted simply in placing them in 
natron for seventy days, after a previous rinsing of the 
abdomen with 'syrmsea.' The material principally used 
in the costlier modes of embalming appears to have been 
asphalt ; wax was more rarely employed. In some cases 
embalming seems to have been effected by immersing 
the body in a bath of molten bitumen. Tanning also was 
resorted to. Occasionally the viscera, after treatment, 
were in part or wholly replaced in the body, together 
with wax figures of the four genii of Amenti. More 



356 



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commonly they were embalmed in a mixture of sand and 
asphalt, and buried in vases, or canopi, placed near the 
mummy, the abdomen being filled with chips and saw- 
dust of cedar and a small quantity of natron. In one jar 
were placed the stomach and large intestine ; in another, 
the small intestines ; in a third, the lungs and heart ; in a 
fourth, the gall-bladder and liver." 

Many of the so-called "mummies" of America are 
not real mummies at all, but have been preserved, not by 
artificial means, but by the coldness and dryness of the 
climate of those countries in which they have been found 
or by certain antiseptic properties in the soils of their 
depositories. Such are those bodies from caves of Ten- 
nessee, Kentucky, the cliff-houses of the southwestern 
part of the United States and many of those from the 
sepulchres of Peru. 

But the ancient nations of the New World, as well 
as those of the Old, had various ways of preserving the 
dead. But none of these ways are very much like those 
of Egypt. The tribes of Virginia, the Carolinas and 
Florida, according to Beverly, first flayed the corpse, 
slitting the skin only in the back ; then cleaned the bones, 
carefully removing all the flesh ; and then, after drying 
them, put them back in the skin, filling the remaining 
cavity with fine white sand. 1 The lord of Chalco, cap- 
turing two Tezcucan princes, had them slain and dried 
and placed as light-holders in his ballroom that he might 
feast his eyes on their hated forms. 2 Among the Aztecs 
the body of the king was washed in aromatic water, after 
which the bowels were removed and the cavity was filled 
with aromatic substances. This was done, not to pre- 
serve the body indefinitely, however, but simply to pre- 



1 "First Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 131. 

2 Bancroft, II : 604. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



357 



serve it until time for burial. 1 Certain Isthmian tribes 
embalmed their caciques by placing them on cane hurdles 
or hanging them up by a cord over a slow fire of herbs 
and drying them very much the same as a farmer does 
hams. 2 In Peru the simplest method of preserving the 
body was by exposing it to the action of the cold, exceed- 
ingly dry and highly rarefied atmosphere of the moun- 
tains. If any other method was employed, it was of a 
primitive character and was in no way similar to those 
methods practiced by the Egyptians. 

Bancroft closes his review of the evidences presented 
to prove the theory of the Egyptian origin of ancient 
American civilization in these words : "But all such anal- 
ogies are far too slender to be worth anything as evi- 
dence ; there is scarcely one of them that would not apply 
to several other nations equally as well as to the Egyp- 
tians." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 63. The claim that 
the ancient Americans possessed a knowledge of the 
customs and habits of Egypt rests, then, upon no better 
foundation than the faint similarities, forced resem- 
blances, vague analogies and accidental coincidences 
which have been traced between the two countries. A 
very unstable foundation, indeed. 

4. Native American Culture of Indigenous Origin. 

Sweeping aside these views of the exotic origin of 
aboriginal American civilization, we may safely accept 
the conclusion that the culture of the ancient inhabitants 
of this continent was native born and bred. So many 
are the indications pointing in this direction that I feel 
warranted in saying that it is the point to which all 
unbiased students will eventually come, and to which 
most have come. 

1 Bancroft, II : 603. 

2 Bancroft, II: 782, 



358 



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But, while it is certain that ancient American culture 
was of indigenous origin and development, no one can 
say that in the past influxes of foreign immigration into 
America did not occur. This is not only possible, but 
probable. All that we can contend for is that the dis- 
tinctive culture of aboriginal America, so far as its char- 
acter is known from the monuments and traditions, bore 
no marks of a foreign impress, and, so far as we can see, 
was purely indigenous. So, if bodies of immigrants did 
come to this continent in ancient times, they were too 
small in numbers or too weak in influence to leave any 
evidence of their existence behind. 

The points of similarity between the Americans a-id 
other peoples are nothing more than we can expect. The 
changes of the moon may be observed in Africa as well 
as in America, and the Hottentot and Cherokee are not 
proved related because they happen to reckon time by 
these changes. Men everywhere have the faculty of 
adhesiveness, and it is no sign that the American Indians 
have come from Polynesia because they have banded 
themselves together into tribes. The faculties of self- 
esteem and approbativeness are specially prominent in 
some races and account for the love of ornamentation 
manifested by the Indians and the Fiji Islanders with- 
out the supposition that they are related. While the 
universal and inherent idea of uncleanness attached to 
the menstrual discharges will fully account for the peri- 
odic separation of the Indian women without us sup- 
posing that the habit was derived from the Jews, I think 
that it is safe to reject, as proving ethnical identity, those 
analogies which may spring from common human in- 
stinct. As for the rest, unless it can be shown that they 
are not mere coincidences, they must be treated as such. 

Turning our attention to the points of difference be- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



350 



tween the culture of the ancient Americans and that of 
the nations of the Old World, we find not only that they 
were numerous, but that they were also radical and vital, 
and show that the separation of the men of this continent 
from those of the other took place long before the 
organization of those kingdoms known to history and 
the development of the higher arts. The most salient 
features of the culture of ancient America, which prove 
its indigenous origin and development, are : 

1. The ignorance on the part of the ancient Ameri- 
cans of the manufacture and use of iron and steel tools. 
This proves that their separation from the people of the 
Old World took place before the upper status of bar- 
barism had been reached, hence before the founding 
of the kingdoms of Egypt and Israel from which the 
Book of Mormon claims the latter colony obtained its 
civilization. 

2. The wide dissimilarity between the languages of 
the Americans and those of the other continent, those 
of America belonging to the polysynthetic group and 
those of Egypt and Palestine belonging to the inflec- 
tional. "While certain characteristics," says Bancroft, 
"are found in common throughout all the languages of 
America, these languages are as a whole sufficiently 
peculiar to be distinguishable from the speech of all the 
other races of the world." — Native Races, Vol. III., 
P- 553- And this proves the vast antiquity of the race, 
an antiquity reaching far back of 6oo B. C. 

3. The peculiar features in the religion and myth- 
ology of the American tribes. The gods of ancient 
America were peculiar to America and were of a lower 
order, even, than the gods of Greece and Egypt. The 
ancient Americans were sun-worshipers and animists, 
and practiced human sacrificing, while their cosmo logical 



36o 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



and eschatological beliefs were peculiar as were also 
their rites and ceremonies. 

4. The peculiar types of American architecture which 
differ from the architectural types of the Old World. 
"There is nothing in any of the remains, so far devel- 
oped," says Dellenbaugh, "that indicates foreign influ- 
ence prior to the Discovery. Every architectural work 
on the continent is purely Amerindian or modified by 
contact with other races subsequent to 1492." — North 
Americans of Yesterday, p. 247. 

5. The ignorance of some of the most-advanced tribes 
of the use of the plummet. "Nor, although they con- 
structed stone walls of considerable height, did they have 
any knowledge of the plumb-line or plummet." — Essays 
of an Americanist, p. 442. This disproves any connection 
of the ancient Americans with the inhabitants of Egypt 
and Palestine at least as late as claimed in the Book of 
Mormon. 

6. The peculiarities of the calendars of the Mayas, 
Mexicans and Muyscas by which they are distinguished 
from the calendar systems of the Egyptians and Jews. 

7. The structure of American society which differed 
from the structure of Oriental society in being founded 
upon the gens or clan as its unit instead of upon the 
family. 

That the reader may know how our archaeologists 
stand on the origin of aboriginal culture, I submit the 
following quotations from their works : 

"It is the spectacle of a people skilled in architecture, 
sculpture and drawing, and, beyond doubt, other more 
perishable arts, and possessing the cultivation and refine- 
ment attendant upon these, and not derived from the 
Old World, but originating and growing up here with- 
out models or masters, having a distinct, separate, inde- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



361 



pendent existence, like the plants and fruits of the soil, 
indigenous." — Stephens, in "Incidents of Travel in Cen- 
tral America," Vol. II., p. 311. 

"The more we study them" — the American monu- 
ments — "the more we find it necessary to believe that 
the civilization they represent was originated in America, 
and probably in the region where they are found. It 
did not come from the Old World ; it was the work of 
some remarkably gifted branch of the race found on the 
southern part of this continent when it was discovered in 
1492. Undoubtedly it was very old. Its original begin- 
ning may have been as old as Egypt, or even farther 
back in the past than the ages to which Atlantis must be 
referred ; and it may have been later than the beginning 
of Egypt. Who can certainly tell its age? Whether 
earlier or later, it was original/' — Ancient America, 
p. 184. 

"We seek, then, in vain for any analogies in art which 
would connect the civilization of this country with that 
of the Old World. That art was not derived from a 
remote source; it was the outgrowth of a people domes- 
ticated to the soil." — Prehistoric Races, p. 330. 

"Though there is no evidence that the Mound Build- 
ers were indigenous, we must admit that their civiliza- 
tion was purely such — the natural product of climate 
and the conditions surrounding them." — North Ameri- 
cans of Antiquity, p. 100. 

"The most competent observers are agreed that 
American art bears the indisputable stamp of its indig- 
enous growth. Those analogies and identities which have 
been brought forward to prove its Asiatic or European 
or Polynesian origin, whether in myth, folklore or tech- 
nical details, belong wholly and only to the uniform 
development of human culture under similar conditions. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



This is their true anthropological interpretation, and 
we need no other." — Myths of the New World, pp. 
33- 34- 

"That successive waves of migration occurred there 
is no reason to doubt, and that these successive bodies of 
immigrants differed to some extent in culture and in race 
is highly probable, but that the distinctively American 
culture which may be traced from the shell-heap to the 
mound, from the mound to the pueblo, from the pueblo 
to the structures of Mexico, Central America and Peru, 
irrespective of race — that this is indebted to an equiva- 
lent foreign culture for its chief features, is utterly 
incapable of proof in fact and highly improbable in 
theory." — Prehistoric America, pp. 523, 524. 

''The generally accepted conclusion in reference to 
the origin of the American aborigines seems to be that 
man reached this continent while the peoples of the Old 
World were yet in a primitive condition, and at a time 
when the highest stage of culture was expressed by the 
knife and spearpoint of chipped stone, and developed in- 
dependently in accord with the natural conditions with 
which he was surrounded." — North America, p. 356. 

'That the Mayas were a race autochthon on the west- 
ern continent and did not receive their civilization from 
Asia or Africa, seems a rational conclusion, to be de- 
duced from the foregoing facts. If we had nothing but 
their name to prove it, it would be sufficient, since its 
etymology is only to be found in the American Maya 
language." — Vestiges of the Mayas, p. 82. 

"It seems that the Amerindian race, while originally 
composed of different elements, was, as a body, separated 
from the other peoples of the world, at a remote epoch, 
and by peculiar climatic and geographic influences, 
welded into an ethnic unity, which was unimpressed by 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



363 



outside influences till modern times." — North Americans 
of Yesterday, p. 458. 

''One of the most difficult problems of North Ameri- 
can archaeology is that relating to the origin and pecul- 
iarities of Mexican and Central American civilization. 
That it was indigenous is now the prevailing opinion 
among antiquarians and ethnologists." — American Ar- 
chaeology, p. 339. 

THE ANTIQUITY OF ABORIGINAL AMERICAN CIVILIZATION. 

On the high antiquity of ancient American civiliza- 
tion the Book of Mormon speaks in no uncertain terms. 
It tells us that the oldest works of Central America, 
Mexico and the United States were erected during a 
period of time beginning about five hundred years after 
the deluge and ending about 600 B. C, and that most of 
the other works of these countries, with many in Peru, 
were constructed during the thousand years intervening 
between the latter date and 400 A. D. According to this 
claim most of the ancient cities of the New World were 
erected before the beginning of the Christian era. 

In its theory of the high antiquity of ancient Ameri- 
can civilization the Book of Mormon has the support of 
most of the earlier archaeologists. It used to be the habit 
with some to reckon the period between the Conquest 
and the golden age of ancient America by millenniums. 
Montesinos had Peru peopled by civilized men five 
centuries after the Deluge. Dupaix declared that Palen- 
que was antediluvian, or, at least, that a flood had once 
covered it. While Catlin claimed that for three thousand 
years the ocean had been the bed of both it and Uxmal. 
Baldwin had the Mound Builders leaving the Mississippi 
Valley not later than two thousand years ago, after occu- 
pying that section for a "very long period," and had them 



304 



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entering Mexico as the Toltecs in the year 955 B. C, 
back of which he traced the civilization of the Colhuas 
for untold ages. And Foster accepts both his theory 
and his date. Running to the opposite extreme is an- 
other class who hold that Palenque, Copan and the other 
cities of Central America were the work of the Toltecs 
after their expulsion from Mexico in the tenth century 
A. D. 

I think that it can truthfully be said that but few of 
the ancient cities of America antedate the beginning of 
the Christian era, though the civilization, or the civiliza- 
tions, that built them may have been centuries in develop- 
ing. The theory that the greater part of the work was 
done before the birth of Christ, and that it was prac- 
tically all completed before the fifth century A. D., as 
claimed by the Mormons, is nullified by every line of 
evidence, traditional, archaeological and historical. 

Some of the cities of Peru which are identified by the 
Committee on American Archaeology with the Nephite 
cities of the Book of Mormon are known to have been 
built both within comparatively recent times, and 
by existing tribes. Gran Chimu is identified with the 
Nephite city of Middoni, but Brinton gives it not only 
a recent origin, but also ascribes it to the Yuncas, a tribe 
that lived in the vicinity at the time of the Spanish Con- 
quest. He says : "There is little doubt but that the Yun- 
cas immigrated to their locality at some not very distant 
period before the conquest. According to their own 
traditions their ancestors journeyed down the coast in 
their canoes from a home to the north, until they reached 
the port of Truxillo. Here they settled and in later years 
constructed the enormous palace known as the Gran 
Chimu, whose massive brick walls, spacious terraces, vast 
galleries and fronts decorated with bas-reliefs and rich 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



365 



frescoes, are still the wonder and admiration of travel- 
ers." — The American Race, p. 224. 

It is also pretty certain that the ''enigmatical ruins" 
of Tiahuanuco, which were deserted when the Spaniards 
came to Peru, are the work of the Aymaras. "The 
observations of David Forbes on the present architecture 
of the Aymaras," Brinton says, "lend strong support to 
his theory that the structures of Tiahuanuco, if not pro- 
jected by that nation, were carried out by Aymara archi- 
tects and workmen." — Ibid, p. 220. 

When the Spaniards came to Peru they found it 
inhabited by two prominent tribes, the Quichuas and 
Aymaras, the latter subject to the former. But this had 
not always been, and not a few of the students of the 
antiquities and history of Peru believe that in the 
earlier period of Peruvian civilization the Aymaras were 
the leading people and that they were "the creators or 
inspirers of the civilization which the Kechuas extended 
so widely over the western coast." — Ibid, p. 219. For 
this reason it seems probable that to them is to be 
ascribed not only Tiahuanuco, but also Old Huanuco, 
Cuzco and other cities of the first epoch of Peruvian 
civilization. 

Passing up into Central America, we find evidence of 
the post-Christian erection of most of the ancient cities 
of that section. This is certainly true of Uxmal, Chichen 
Itza, Peten and most of the others of Yucatan, and it has 
been maintained, by some writers, even for Palenque, 
Copan and T'Ho. 

Palenque is conceded to be one of the oldest cities 
in Central America. It was deserted when Cortez con- 
quered Mexico, and probably had been for some time. 
The traditional date of its founding, according to Ordo- 
nez, is 955 B. C, and its founder, according to the 



366 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



Tzendals, was Votan. But this date is by no means 
established, and it is probable that the Mayan occupancy 
of this region began subsequent to it. Bancroft, after 
giving the traditional date of its founding, says : "Pa- 
lenque may be conjecturally referred to a period between 
the first and eighth centuries/' — Native Races, Vol. IV., 
p. 362. And Nadaillac says: "The most daring conjec- 
tures do not admit of our dating the monuments of 
Palenque earlier than the first centuries of our era." — 
Prehistoric America, p. 322. While Peet declares that 
the ruined cities of this continent "do not date earlier 
than five hundred years after Christ." — Ancient Monu- 
ments and Ruined Cities (Introduction). 

Copan is identified by the Committee on American 
Archaeology as a Jaredite city, probably Moron. This 
would put its founding two thousand or more years be- 
fore Christ. But, on the contrary, if tradition is to be 
trusted, it could not have been built so very long before 
the Conquest, for the account of its founding was yet in 
the memory of the natives when they first met the Span- 
iards. These ruins were first visited by Diego de Palacio 
in the year 1576, and the description that he has left is 
pronounced by Maudsley, the English explorer, to be 
"such a one as might have been written by any intelligent 
visitor within even the last few years." Palacio gave the 
following native account of the founding of the city: "I 
endeavored with all possible care to ascertain from the 
Indians, through the traditions derived from the ancients, 
what people lived here, or what they knew or had heard 
from their ancestors concerning them. But they had no 
books relating to their antiquities, nor do I believe that 
in all this district there is more than one, which I pos- 
sess. They say that in ancient times there came from 
Yucatan a great lord, who built these edifices, but that 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



367 



at the end of some years he returned to his native coun- 
try, leaving them entirely deserted. And this is what 
appears most likely, for tradition says that the people of 
Yucatan in time past conquered the provinces of Uyajal, 
Lacandon, Verapaz, Chiquimula and Copan, and it is 
certain that the Apay language, which is spoken here, is 
current and understood in Yucatan and the aforesaid 
provinces." 1 

The cities of Yucatan were, no doubt, erected after 
Palenque and by colonies from the country of which that 
city was the capital or the chief religious center. The 
first people are, however, said to have come from the 
east, and are called in the traditions cental, or "little 
descent," because of the smallness of their numbers. The 
others, who came from the west, are called nohenial, or 
"great descent." The first are thought by some to have 
come from the Old World, but Lizana believes that they 
came from Cuba, and Orozco y Berra thinks that they 
came from Florida. Fancourt, Brinton, Thomas and 
most other recent writers reject in toto the idea of an 
eastern immigration and bring the ancient inhabitants 
from the west or northwest. And this is in accord with 
all the other evidences. The Yucatec hero was Zamna, 
who is said to have introduced Maya institutions, divided 
the country into provinces and named the various local- 
ities on the peninsula. He died at an advanced age and 
was buried at Izamal. Following the rule of Zamna, the 
Itzaob, three most holy men, ruled over the Itzas at 
Chichen Itza. One of these brothers was Kukulkan, the 
Quetzalcoatl of the Nahuas. The founding of Chichen 
Itza is fixed by Thomas in the sixth century A. D. "The 
date of the founding of Chichen is of course unknown, 



1 "American Archaeology," p. 307, 



368 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



yet the traditions, as shown by the author in his 'Study 
of the Manuscript Troano,' appear to indicate the sixth 
century A. D. as the probable date." — American Archae- 
ology, p. 302. Following the Itzas the Tutul Xiu reigned 
in Yucatan. Perez gives 173 A. D. as the date of their 
migration from Chiapas, but Bancroft, who computes 
their periods differently, fixes it as late as 401 and would 
have them enter the southern part of the peninsula in 
the year 482. 1 But be this as it may, it is certain that 
this royal family entered Yucatan after the beginning of 
the Christian era and that they erected the city of Uxmal 
in the early part of the twelfth century. On the antiquity 
of the cities of Yucatan Bancroft writes: "The history 
of the Mayas indicates the building of some of the cities 
at various dates from the third to the tenth centuries. 
As I have said before, there is nothing in the buildings 
to indicate the date of their erection — that they were or 
were not standing at the commencement of the Christian 
era." — Native Races, Vol. IV., p. 284. 

The reasons that some writers have advanced for 
believing that the cities of Central America are of great 
antiquity are: (1) Their extremely dilapidated condition. 
(2) The immense trees and the great amount of vege- 
table mould found upon them. And (3) the ignorance 
of the natives concerning their origin and history. But 
in answer to these it may be said, first, that the buildings 
were usually made of soft limestone, which under the 
action of tropical rains, heat and vegetation soon pre- 
sents an antiquated appearance : second, that in a trop- 
ical "climate the growth of forest trees, and the conse- 
quent accumulation of vegetable mould, is so rapid that 
by this evidence the ruins could, at best, be given an 



1 Bancroft, V: 627. 



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369 



antiquity of but a few hundred years ; and, third, that 
the ignorance of the natives in regard to their origin is 
due to the weakness of the primitive mind in retaining 
the most signal events after the lapse of a few genera- 
tions. Yet we know that the Tzendals, Quiches and 
Mayas did possess traditions by which they were con- 
nected with the people who built Palenque and the other 
Central American cities. 

It will not be necessary to take up the question of 
the antiquity of the Mound Builders, as it has already 
been considered. Suffice it to say that it is conceded by 
all that the mound-building period did not close until 
after the European occupation began, and by most all 
that it did not begin until after the commencement of 
the Christian era. And what has been said for the an- 
tiquity of the Mound Builders can also be said for the 
antiquity of the Cliff Dwellers. 

The views of most recent writers on the antiquity of 
native American civilization are ably set forth in the 
following by Dr. Brinton, an authority whose opinions, 
though not always accepted, are always respected by 
other archaeologists : 

"When we turn to the monumental data, to the archi- 
tecture and structural relics of the ancient Americans, 
we naturally think first of the imposing, stone-built fort- 
resses of Peru, the massive pyramids and temples of 
Yucatan and Mexico, and the vast brick-piles of the 
Pueblo Indians. 

"It is doubtful if any of these notable monuments 
supply prehistoric dates of excessive antiquity. The 
pueblos, both those now occupied and the vastly greater 
number whose ruins lie scattered over the valleys and 
mesas of New Mexico and Arizona, were constructed 
by the ancestors of the tribes who still inhabit that 



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region, and this at no distant day. Though we can not 
assign exact dates to the development of this peculiar 
civilization, there are abundant reasons, drawn from lan- 
guage, physical geography and the character of the 
architecture, to include all these structures within the 
period since the commencement of our era. 

"There is every reason to suppose that the same is 
true of all the stone and brick edifices of Mexico and 
Central America. The majority of them were occupied 
at the period of the Conquest; others were in process of 
building; and of others the record of the date of their 
construction was clearly in memory and was not distant. 
Thus, the famous temple of Huitzilopochtli at Tenoch- 
titlan, and the spacious palace — or, if you prefer the 
word, 'communal house' — of the ruler of Tezcuco, had 
been completed within the lifetime of many who met the 
Spaniards. To be sure, even then there were once 
famous cities fallen to ruins and sunk to oblivion in the 
tropical forests. Such was Palenque, which could not 
have failed to attract the attention of Cortez had it been 
inhabited. Such also was T'Ho, on the site of the pres- 
ent city of Merida, Yucatan, where the earliest explorers 
found lofty stone mounds and temples covered with a 
forest as heavy as the primitive growth around it. But 
tradition and the present condition of such of these old 
cities as have been examined unite in the probability that 
they do not antedate the Conquest more than a few cen- 
turies. 

"In the opinion of some observers, the enigmatical 
ruins on the plains of Tiahuanaco, a few leagues from 
the shore of Lake Titicaca, in Peru, carry us far, very 
far, beyond any such modern date. 'Even the memory 
of their builders,' says one of the more recent visitors to 
these marvelous relics, Gen. Bartolome Mitre, 'even their 



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371 



memory was lost thousands of years before the discovery 
of America.' 

"Such a statement is neither more nor less than a 
confession of ignorance. We have not discovered the 
period nor the people concerned in the ruins of Tiahu- 
anaco. It must be remembered that they are not the 
remains of a populous city, but merely the foundations 
and beginnings of some vast religious edifice which was 
left incomplete, probably owing to the death of the pro- 
jector or to unforeseen difficulties. If this is borne in 
mind, much of the obscurity about the origin, the pur- 
pose and the position of these structures will be removed. 
They do not justify a claim to an age of thousands of 
years before the Conquest; hundreds will suffice. Nor is 
it necessary to assent to the opinion advanced by 
General Mitre, and supported by some other archaeol- 
ogists, that the most ancient monuments in America 
are those of most perfect construction, and, there- 
fore, that in this continent there has been, in civiliza- 
tion, not progress, but failure ; not advance, but retro- 
gression. 

"The uncertainty which rests over the age of the 
structures at Tiahuanaco is scarcely greater than that 
which still shrouds the origin of the mounds and earth- 
works of the Ohio and Upper Mississippi Valleys. Yet 
I venture to say that the opinion is steadily gaining 
ground that these interesting memorials of vanished na- 
tions are not older than the medieval period of Euro- 
pean history. The condition of the arts which they 
reveal indicates a date that we must place among the 
more recent in American chronology. The simple fact 
that tobacco and maize were cultivated plants is evi- 
dence enough for this." — Essays of an Americanist, pp. 
25-27. 



372 



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CERTAIN FEATURES OF AMERICAN CIVILIZATION WHICH 
PLAINLY OPPOSE THE BOOK OF MORMON. 

I. The ancient Americans did not manufacture iron. 

On the other hand, the peoples described in the Book 
of Mormon are said to have been iron workers who did 
not use stone at all in the manufacture of their tools and 
weapons, and who were as far advanced as the civilized 
nations of Europe, Asia and Africa in the time of Christ. 

The Book of Mormon says of the Jaredites : "And 
they did work in all manner of ore, and they did make 
gold, and silver, and iron, and brass, and all manner of 
metals." — Ether 4: 7. 

On the use of iron among the Nephites, we have the 
following passages : 

"And I" — Nephi — "did teach my people to build 
buildings: and to work in all manner of wood, and of 
iron, and of copper, and of brass, and of steel, and of 
gold, and of silver, and of precious ores, which were in 
great abundance." — 2 Nephi 4: 3. 

"And we multiplied exceedingly, and spread upon the 
face of the land, and became exceeding rich in gold, and 
in silver, and in precious things, and in fine workman- 
ship of wood, in buildings, and in machinery, and also in 
iron, and copper, and brass, and steel, making all manner 
of tools of every kind to till the ground, and weapons of 
war." — Jarom 1 : 4. 

"And it came to pass that king Noah built many 
elegant and spacious buildings ; and he ornamented them 
with fine work of wood, and of all manner of precious 
things, of gold, and of silver, and of iron, and of brass, 
and of ziff, and of copper." — Mosiah 7: 2. 

In proof of this claim we are referred to the fact 
that certain South American tribes had names for the 



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373 



metal in their languages. "Some of the languages of 
the country, and perhaps all," says Baldwin, in speaking 
of Peru, "had names for iron; in official Peruvian it was 
called qnillay, and in the old Chilean tongue panilic. 'It 
is remarkable,' observes Molina, 'that iron, which had 
been thought unknown to the ancient Americans, has 
particular names in some of their tongues.' It is not 
easy to understand why they had names for this metal, 
if they never at any time had knowledge of the metal 
itself." — Ancient America, p. 248. 

Elders Etzenhouser and Stebbins also mention the 
finding of certain iron and steel tools in the mounds of 
North America as corroborating these passages in the 
Book of Mormon. These finds consisted of the remains 
of iron, and perhaps steel, knives, part of a steel bow, 
etc. Mr. Stebbins gives the destructiveness of rust as 
the reason why more of such implements have not been 
found. He says: "Of course this fact of the speedy 
decay of iron and steel is sufficient reason why weapons 
and tools that were used by the Jaredites and Nephites 
have not been found by us. But the testimonies already 
presented leave no room for saying that the Book of 
Mormon is false in saying that those ancients did have 
full knowledge and use of iron and steel in those ancient 
times." — Lectures, p. 278. 

But, after nearly a hundred years of research, our 
archaeologists have decided that these evidences are in- 
sufficient to establish the claim that the ancient Ameri- 
cans were workers in iron. The mere fact that some of 
the South American tribes had names for the metal 
proves nothing, as these names may have been invented 
in a number of ways. They may have been coined at the 
time these tribes first saw the iron implements of the 
whites, or, what is more probable, they may have been 



374 



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applied to the metal in its crude state. As iron ore is 
found in all parts of America, and as some of the tribes 
are known to have worked it into implements by a 
process of chipping and grinding, this latter seems the 
most reasonable explanation of the presence of these 
names in the vocabularies of certain tribes. Nothing can 
be better established than that the Peruvians did not use 
manufactured-iron tools and implements. 

As for the iron articles in the mounds of North 
America, instead of proving that the Mound Builders 
were iron workers, they prove that those mounds in 
which they have been found have been erected within 
historic times. These tools and implements bear so many 
marks of European workmanship that this can no longer 
be either successfully denied or reasonably doubted. The 
following account from Professor Thomas, of the find- 
ing of an old-fashioned case-knife in a mound in Ten- 
nessee, in the "Twelfth Annual Report of the Bureau of 
American Ethnology," 1 will make this plain : 

"Suppose, for example, that a mound is found in 
Tennessee, which in appearance, construction and con- 
tents, with a single exception, is in every respect pre- 
cisely like those attributed to the so-called Veritable 
Mound Builders,' and that this single exception is an 
ordinary, old-fashioned, steel-bladed 'case-knife' with a 
bone handle, found at the bottom of the tumulus, where 
it could not reasonably be attributed to an intrusive 
burial, must we conclude that the 'veritable Mound 
Builders' manufactured knives of this class? Yet a case 
precisely of this kind in every particular occurred during 
the investigation carried on by the Bureau of Ethnology 
in 1884." 



1 See also "Ohio Mounds" and "Work in Mound Exploration" for 
similar relics. 



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375 



I presume that there is not a Latter-day Saint who 
will claim that this bone-handled case-knife was manu- 
factured by the Mound Builders, and as there are many 
other relics from the mounds as conclusively European, 
we can reasonably attribute the rest to the same source. 

The assertion that oxidization will account for the al- 
most total absence of iron tools and weapons among the 
antiquities of America is without good foundation, for 
the conditions of many localities in the Old World, where 
iron tools and implements of great age have been found 
in an excellent state of preservation, are not as conducive 
to the preservation of the metal as are the conditions of 
many of the localities of the New. 

In the debris of Khorsabad, Babylonia, Hilprecht 
tells us, Place discovered "iron implements of every de- 
scription in such a fine state of preservation that several 
of them were used at once by his Arab workmen." — 
Explorations in Bible Lands, p. 83. At Nimrud Layard 
found "a large quantity of iron scales of Assyrian 
armor" {Ibid, p. 106), besides "iron implements such as 
picks, saws, hammers, etc." {Ibid, p. 124). While* at 
Nippur a number of iron nails and two iron bands were 
taken from the ruins {Ibid, p. 505). Now, if the ancient 
Americans used iron and steel exclusively for cutting 
tools and weapons, why can we not find them, or at least 
their rust, in the cold, dry regions of Peru and Ari- 
zona ? In both these countries even vegetable matter has 
been preserved for untold centuries. In Peru we find 
not only the preserved corpses of the ancient inhabitants, 
but also such articles and materials as cactus thorns, 
wool, thread, locks of hair, pieces of cloth sometimes 
entire, wooden needles, cocoa leaves and shells entombed 
with them. While in the section of the Cliff Dwellers, 
deposited with the mummies, have been found such arti- 



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cles and materials as ears of corn, yucca leaves, skins, 
pumpkin shells, cornmeal, wooden spoons and cotton 
cloth. It i-s indeed strange, if the early inhabitants of 
those regions were Nephites and Gadiantons, that their 
more perishable possessions have been preserved, while 
every vestige of their iron tools and weapons has been 
wiped out. 

We are informed by good authorities that in Peru 
stone was used exclusively by the ancient inhabitants out 
of which to manufacture their surgical instruments. 
Probably the most complete collection of ancient crania 
from that country was that of Dr. Manuel Antonio 
Muniz, at one time surgeon-general of the army of Peru. 
His collection consisted of over a thousand crania, of 
which nineteen were trephined, several more than once. 
All of these crania, with the exception of the nineteen, 
were destroyed a few years ago in a political disturbance, 
and these, with a single exception, were placed in the 
National Museum of the United States for preservation. 
In his excellent paper, "Primitive Trephining in Peru," 
published in the "Sixteenth Annual Report of the Bureau 
of American Ethnology," p. 59, Prof. W. J. McGee de- 
scribes these trephined skulls, with others from the same 
country, and says on the instruments used by the ancient 
inhabitants for the purpose of performing this operation: 
"Putting the various dimensions" — of the incisions made 
in the skulls — "together, they are found to define a blade 
corresponding with an ordinary stone knife or spearhead, 
or with an arrowpoint attached to a short haft, while the 
dimensions are inconsistent with those possessed by any 
known cutting instrument of metal. Considering next 
the longitudinal striae in the sides of the kerfs, it appears 
that they would naturally and necessarily be produced by 
the reciprocal operation of a knife or spearhead chipped 



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377 



from stone of coarse texture, or of such structure as to 
give a splintery fracture, and that these features would 
not be produced by any known single-point tool of metal, 
polished stone, tooth or shell. Accordingly, the detailed 
features displayed by the collection afford practically 
conclusive evidence that the incising instrument was a 
stone blade of common form and character. There is 
absolutely no suggestion in any of the specimens that the 
kerfs were produced by any other kind of tool, either of 
other material than stone or of other form than a blunt, 
single-tip blade." 

Peru presents to us a number of imposing ruins built 
of colossal stones. How these stones could have been 
prepared without steel tools has been the wonder of 
archaeologists. Elder Phillips, in his tract, "The Book of 
Mormon Verified," p. 15, asks: "How could such works 
be hewn from stone without iron tools?" And then sar- 
castically exclaims : "Perhaps they did it with their finger 
nails!" That they did it with neither iron tools nor yet 
with their finger nails we know. On their substitute for 
steel Prescott writes : "The natives were unacquainted 
with the use of iron, though the soil was largely impreg- 
nated with it. The tools used were of stone, or more 
frequently of copper. But the material on which they 
relied for the execution of their most difficult tasks was 
formed by combining a very small portion of tin with 
copper. This composition gave a hardness to the metal 
which seems to have been little inferior to that of steel." 
— Conquest of Peru, Vol. I., p. 92. 

That the ancient Peruvians did not use iron and steel 
tools is now conceded. Says Bancroft: "Iron ore is very 
abundant in Peru, but the only evidence that iron was 
used is the difficulty of executing the native works of 
excavation and cutting stone without it, and the fact that 



378 



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the metal had a name in the native language. No traces 
of it have ever been found." — Native Races, Vol. IV., 
P- 794- 

Passing up into the land of the Mayas, we find no 
evidence whatever that this people, or any other who 
inhabited that region, used the metal. One of the strong- 
est evidences of this is that the hard, flinty spots in the 
stones from which their statues were ' carved are left 
uncut. 'That iron and steel were not used for cutting 
implements," says Bancroft, "is clearly proved by the 
fact that hard, flinty spots in the soft stone of the statues 
are left uncut, in some instances where they interfere 
with the details of the sculpture." — Native Races, Vol. 
IV., p. 102. 

He adds that the chay-stone points found in the ruins 
are sufficiently hard to work the soft material. 

Dellenbaugh says : "So far no prehistoric iron has 
been found in the ruins of Yucatan." — North Americans, 
of Yesterday, p. 8i. 

Nadaillac says of the remains of Chiapas and Yuca- 
tan : "Hieroglyphics, true conventional signs, mark then 
a period of human evolution. They are met with on the 
monuments of Chiapas as on those of Yucatan; on the 
walls of Palenque or Copan as on those of Chichen Itza 
or Quirigua ; they were sculptured or engraved on gran- 
ite or on porphyry, with quartzite and obsidian imple- 
ments. Iron, we repeat, was absolutely unknown; no- 
where do we find it mentioned, and nowhere do we meet 
with the characteristic rust which is the undeniable proof 
of its presence." — Prehistoric America, pp. 377, 378. 

At the time of the Conquest the Mexicans, Prescott 
tells us, "used only copper instruments, with an alloy of 
tin, and a siliceous powder, to cut the hardest stones, and 
some of them of enormous dimensions." He adds: "This 



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379 



fact, with the additional circumstance that only similar 
tools have been found in Central America, strengthens 
the conclusion that iron was neither known there nor in 
ancient Egypt." — Conquest of Mexico, Vol. III., p. 406. 
As the Mexicans at the time of the Conquest used only 
these simple tools, and as there is no evidence of the pre- 
historic use of iron, we are justified in believing that 
their early ancestors had no others. 

Notwithstanding the fact that a few iron implements 
have been found in the mounds, all archaeologists, of any 
note whatever, declare that the Mound Builders did not 
use this metal. 

"He" — the Ohio Mound Builder — "failed to grasp 
the idea of . . . the use of metal (except in the cold 
state)." — Primitive Man in Ohio, p. 200. 

"The Mound Builders were acquainted with several 
of the metals, and had their implements and ornaments 
of copper; silver in the form of ornaments is occasionally 
found ; galena occurs in considerable quantities, while no 
trace of iron has been discovered." — The Mound Build- 
ers, p. 72. 

'There is no evidence that the use of iron was known, 
except the extreme difficulty of clearing forests and carv- 
ing stone with implements of stone and soft copper." — 
Native Races, Vol. IV., p. 779. 

"Iron and bronze appear to have been practically un- 
known to them, and in no part of a vast territory they 
occupied have excavations revealed the existence or the 
use of any metal but native copper, with its associated 
silver, gold and a few fragments of meteoric iron." — 
Prehistoric America, p. 129. 

"The use of iron as a metal was unknown in America 
previous to the discovery by Columbus." — American 
Archaeology, p. 11. 



3 8o CUMORAH REVISITED 

2. The ancient Americans did not have the horse. 

The Book of Mormon declares that the Jaredites and 
Nephites had the horse and other domestic animals. 

Of the former, Ether says: "And the Lord began 
again to take the curse from off the land, and the hotire 
of Emer did prosper exceedingly under the reign of 
Emer ; and in the space of sixty and two years, they had 
become exceeding strong, insomuch that they became ex- 
ceeding rich, having all manner of fruit, and of grain, 
and of silks, and of fine linen, and of gold, and of silver, 
and of precious things, and also all manner of cattle, of 
oxen, and cows, and of sheep, and of swine, and of 
goats, and also many other kind of animals which were 
useful for the food of man; and they also had horses, 
and asses, and there were elephants, and cureloms, and 
cumoms : all of which were useful unto man, and more 
especially the elephants, and cureloms, and cumoms."— 
Ether 4 : 3. 

After the extermination of the Jaredites these domes- 
tic animals became wild, and when the Nephites entered 
Peru they are said to have found in the wilderness "both 
the cow, and the ox, and the ass, and the horse, and the 
goat, and the wild goat, and all manner of wild animals, 
which were for the use of men." — 1 Nephi 5 : 45. See 
also Enos 1 : 6, Alma 12: 11 and Alma 12: 24. 

To make it appear to their readers that these refer- 
ences relative to the use of the horse by the civilized 
nations of ancient America are confirmed by scientific 
research, Mormon writers 1 hand out the following quo- 
tations from geologists : 

"In North America ... in the Champlain period there 
were great elephants and mastodons, oxen, horses, stags, 



1 "Stebbins," p. 279. "Etzenhouser," pp. 23, 24. "Blair," p. 166. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



38i 



beaver, and some edentates in quartenary North America, 
unsurpassed by any in the world." — /. D. Dana, LL. D., 
in "Text-book of Geology," p. 319. 

"We know that the equine type of quadrupeds existed 
in America from the period of the Eocene. We are, in 
fact, acquainted with twenty-one species of horse-like 
animals, and the genus of true horses has been traced 
down to the times preceding the present." — Professor 
Winchell, in "Evolution," p. 82. 

"Seven species of rhinoceros existed on the plains of 
Colorado ; twenty-seven species of horses also cropped 
the herbage of those vast savannas, varying in size from 
that of our domestic variety, down to that of a New 
Foundland dog." — Professor Hayden, in "Explorations 
of the West." 

If our Mormon friends will grant that the Jaredites 
and Nephites were here in the "Champlain period," or 
before that in the period of the "Eocene," we will grant 
that they could have had horses in abundance, but until 
this concession is made we shall feel ourselves justified 
in denying that these quotations in any way corroborate 
the claim of the Book of Mormon. 

No one who has studied geology will deny that in the 
earlier epochs the horse was an inhabitant of this conti- 
nent along with many other species now extinct. And it 
is also probable that the horse and man were coexistent 
for sometime after the latter's arrival. Thus much I 
concede. But that the horse was here when man had 
developed himself into a semi-civilized being, and at the 
time those cities which have been attributed to the Jared- 
ites and Nephites were erected, I most emphatically deny. 
For some unknown cause the horse long ago became 
extinct on the western continent, and remained so until 
the coming of the Europeans. "There is no doubt," says 



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Brinton, "but that the horse existed on the continent con- 
temporaneously with postglacial man; and some palaeon- 
tologists are of the opinion that the European and Asian 
horses were descendants of the American species; but 
for some mysterious reason the genus became extinct in 
the New World many generations before its discovery/' 
— The American Race, p. 50. 

That it was not employed as a beast of burden by 
the builders of the structures of Peru, Central America 
and the Mississippi Valley is made evident by the absence 
of its remains among the ruins and of its carved form on 
any of the ancient statuary. 

"The builders" — of the mounds — "had no beasts of 
burden. These large structures were, therefore, built by 
man unaided." — Prehistoric America, p. 85. 

"The mound builders had neither iron nor steel of 
which to form spades and shovels, nor had they beasts 
of burden to assist in the transportation of material." — 
American Archaeology, p. 61. 

"The Amerinds of North America as a race possessed 
no beast of burden but the dog. . . . The Amerinds 
encountered on the plains of Texas in 1540 by Coronado 
were using the dog, just as they afterwards used the 
horse, for transporting tents and tent-poles." — North 
Americans of Yesterday, pp. 276, 277. 

3. The ancient Americans did not possess the domes- 
ticated cereals of the Old World. 

Mosiah says of the Nephites : "And we began to till 
the ground, yea, even with all manner of seeds, with 
seeds of corn, and of wheat, and of barley, and with 
neas, and with sheum, and with seeds of all manner of 
fruits ; and we did begin to multiply and prosper in the 
land." — Mosiah 6: 2. 

But where is the proof of this extraordinary asser- 



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383 



tion? It seems very probable that, if the Americans had 
once had wheat and barley, they would not have given 
up their cultivation and use, and yet they were not to be 
found in America when the Europeans came. "Wheat, 
rye, barley, oats, millet, and rice," says Nadaillac, "were 
unknown to the Indians." — Prehistoric America, p. 4. 

Besides, no remains of wheat, barley or Oriental 
corn have ever been found in any of the ancient gran- 
aries or cemeteries on the continent. In Peru, Arizona 
and at Madisonville, Ohio, maize, in some instances 
charred, has been taken from graves and other places, 
but not a vestige of wheat or barley has ever been found. 



384 



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CHAPTER VIII. 

The Native Religions of America — The Native Idea of God — 
The Trinity — Quetzalcoatl — The Devil — The Cross — The 
Priesthood — Rites and Ceremonies — Cosmogony — Eschatol- 
ogy — Mythology — The Ancient Religions as Revealed in the 
Remains. 

The ancient Americans were religious peoples. This 
is proved by the great number of their magnificent tem- 
ples, sculptured altars and hideous idols found through- 
out the country. It is estimated that at the time of the 
Conquest there were in Anahuac alone forty thousand 
temples and places of worship, of which no less than two 
thousand were in the City of Mexico; while Pizarro 
found in Cuzco, the capital of Peru, between three and 
four hundred, chief of which was the temple of the sun, 
which was so lavishly ornamented with the precious 
metal that it was given the name of the "Place of Gold." 
In addition to these centers of primitive worship we have 
scores of others, prominent among them being Pachaca- 
mac and the Island of Titicaca in Peru, Palenque in 
Chiapas and Cholula and Teotihuacan in Mexico. 

Throughout the entire continent the native races held 
certain fundamental religious beliefs in common. All 
American tribes, with probably not an exception, held as 
sacred the number 4, which answered to the four car- 
dinal points from whence come the fertilizing showers ; 
a belief in, and a fear of, unseen spirits seems to have 
pervaded universally the native mind, while the notion of 
the former appearance of culture heroes, and the cultural 
improvement attending their appearance, was found not 
only among the more civilized tribes, but also among 



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385 



many who are not classed as civilized. But, on the other 
hand, as we trace the religious conceptions and practices 
of the red race further, we find them differing to an 
astonishing degree, so that, instead of one system, we 
find them presenting many systems differing in their 
deities, in the organization of their priesthoods, in their 
conceptions of the after life, and in their rites and cere- 
monies. 

The lowest form of theism in America was fetichism; 
the highest, that form of polytheism known as henothe- 
ism, which is defined as ''the worship of the nature 
powers as personified, but making some one of these 
powers the chief object of worship and ascribing to it a 
personal character, but also personifying other nature 
powers and making them subordinate." 1 Between these 
wide extremes lay a broad field of various grades and 
diversified forms of religious thought. 

Says Nadaillac: "So far as we can judge at the pres- 
ent day, religious ideas were met with amongst all the 
American races, but with the most striking contrasts. 
Some tribes had not got beyond fetichism, the most de- 
graded and primitive form of worship. Idolatry, which 
prevailed amongst the nations of Central America, was a 
higher form; the savage adored the waves of the sea, the 
trees of the forest, the waters of the spring, the stars of 
the firmament, the stones beneath his feet ; he invested 
with supernatural power the first object to strike his eyes 
or impress his imagination. The idolater is superior to 
the fetich worshiper; he adores the god of the sun, of 
the sea, of the forest, of the spring; he often clothes 
this god, before whom he trembles, with a human form, 
and attributes to him the passions of his own heart. 



1 "Myths and Symbols," p. 4. 



386 



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Monotheism, from a purely philosophical point of view, 
is a great advance. It has been said that the Aztecs 
adored an invisible god, Teotl, the supreme master, but 
this fact is disputed, and everything goes to prove on 
the contrary that polytheism existed amongst them, and 
a very inferior polytheism, too, to that, for instance, 
which history records among the Egyptians or the 
Greeks. The number of secondary divinities was very 
considerable; every tribe, every family, every profession 
had its patrons, and thought to do honor to its gods by 
severe fasts, prolonged chastity, baths — purifications, and 
often also cruel mortifications." — Prehistoric America, 
pp. 291, 292. 

Aboriginal American worship may be divided into 
five stages or classes, 1 which are : 

1. Spirit worship, the worship of invisible spirits, 
which appears most prominently among the fishing tribes 
of the far north, the Tinneh and the Aleuts. This form 
of religion is called shamanism. 

2. Fetich worship, the worship of stones, trees, moun- 
tains, etc. It appears extensively among the tribes of 
the southwest. 

3. Animal worship, the worship of beasts, birds and 
reptiles, such as the dog, coyote, eagle and rattlesnake. 
Animal worship was chiefly the religion of the hunting 
tribes of North America. 

4. Sky worship, the worship of the heavenly bodies 
and the elements and phenomena which in the savage 
mind are intimately associated with the sky. This form, 
which appears in all parts of the New World, includes 
the worship of the sun, moon, stars, thunder, lightning, 
wind, the clouds and rain. 



1 Rev. S. D. Peet differs slightly from this classification, See "Myths 
and Symbols," Chapter XIII, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



387 



5. Hero zuorship, the worship of heroes and deified 
men, found in its highest form of development among 
the Aztecs, Mayas and other advanced tribes. 

It is believed that this classification is broad enough 
to include all the varied forms of worship of the native 
races of this continent. These forms seldom, if ever, 
appear alone in any one tribe, but are associated together, 
although one form may appear with greater prominence 
than the rest. 

On the origin of the American religious systems 
various opinions have been expressed, but these may be 
grouped together in two general theories. One is that 
they are, either in whole or in part, of exotic origin ; the 
other is that they are of indigenous origin and develop- 
ment. By those who hold to their exotic origin the sup- 
posed belief of the Indian in a "Great Spirit" and a 
"Happy Hunting-ground," his use of the symbolism of 
the cross, his belief in a flood or floods, and a hundred 
other points of resemblance to the beliefs and practices 
of the Old World nations, are held up as proof of his 
Asiatic, European or African origin. But this theory 
no longer holds the assent of the larger body of Ameri- 
can anthropologists. To most of the later students the 
American religions, like everything else pertaining to the 
ancient culture of this continent, were of indigenous 
origin and development, the points of resemblance prov- 
ing, not common origin, but common nature and like 
environment. On the similarity of the myths of America 
to those of the Old World, Dellenbaugh writes as fol- 
lows : "There is in some respects so great a similarity 
between the myths of the New World and those of the 
Old that it was at first assumed that there must have 
been early communication with Europe, but more careful 
analysis has shown that this is but another evidence of 



388 



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what may be called the parallelism of human develop- 
ment. Even where the similarity is greatest there is 
nothing to prove that the myths did not originate inde- 
pendently, and they are merely the results of similar 
thoughts, in similar stages of ignorance, about the sun, 
the sky and natural forces." — North Americans of Yes- 
terday, p. 396. 

There are four lines of evidence by which a conclu- 
sion on the character of the ancient American religions 
may be arrived at: 

1. By history — by the accounts that have been given 
of native worship by the Europeans who first came in 
contact with it. History, however, can only give us 
the beliefs and rites of the American tribes since 1492, 
yet from them we can draw some reasonable inferences 
as to the character of the religions of pre-Columbian 
times. 

2. By mythology — by the myths and traditions that 
have been handed down from generation to generation. 
This, however, is not so certain, as it is impossible 
always to tell just what is historical and what is purely 
mythical. 

3. By etymology — by the meaning of their terms for 
god, heaven, spirit, etc. Such terms are intimately inter- 
woven into man's religious fabric, and the ideas that they 
conveyed to the historic tribes will be a clue which will 
throw a ray of light on the beliefs and practices of their 
ancestors. 

4. By archaeology — by those relics which they have 
left, such as temples, altars, idols, burial-places, etc. This 
is the most certain of all the ways of determining what 
the ancient Americans believed and practiced. The struc- 
ture of their temples, the carvings on their statuary, the 
forms of their altars and the designs painted on their 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



389 



temple walls are certain indices of their religious opin- 
ions. 

The Book of Mormon teaches that the first Ameri- 
cans, the Jaredites, were monotheists ; that, after their 
destruction, they were followed, about 600 B. C, by a 
colony from Jerusalem which kept the law of Moses ; 
that this Colony, soon after its arrival, divided into two 
factions, the Nephites and Lamanites, the first continu- 
ing in the faith of their fathers, the second apostatizing 
therefrom; that, at the advent of Christ, the Nephites 
became Christians, and continued as such nearly down 
to their overthrow in 385 A. D. ; while the Lamanites, 
with the exception of during a short period, continued a 
sinful and vain people. This, in brief, is the outline of 
the religious history of the ancient Americans as given 
in the Book of Mormon. 

Mormons tell us that the Indian's belief in the "Great 
Spirit," his traditions of culture heroes — who in some 
points resembled Jesus Christ — his knowledge of the 
Trinity, his fear of the spirit of evil, his belief in the 
immortality of the soul, a resurrection of the dead, future 
rewards and punishments, and a " Happy Hunting- 
ground," and his practice of baptism, with many other 
beliefs and ceremonies, fully substantiate the claim of the 
Book of Mormon that Judaism and Christianity were the 
religions of the civilized peoples in ancient times. But I 
do not hesitate to say that neither in the archaeological 
remains, nor in the myths and traditions, nor in the relig- 
ious terms, nor in the beliefs and practices of the historic 
tribes, is there any evidence that the ancient Americans 
were Jews and Christians. 



390 



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THE NATIVE IDEA OF GOD. 

The popular conception of the deity of the red man 
is that of a personality to whom ail the tribes gave the 
appellation of "Great Spirit." Novelists and poets have 
used this term until the great majority of the people are 
wholly ignorant of its erroneousness. Even Catlin, whose 
interesting book on Indian life we all read with delight, 
says : "The first and most striking fact amongst the 
North American Indians that refers us to the Jews is 
that of their worshiping, in all parts, the Great Spirit, 
or Jehovah, as the Hebrews were ordered to do by divine 
precept, instead of a plurality of gods, as the ancient 
pagans and heathens did, and the idols of their own for- 
mation." Of course the Mormons have profited by the 
popular belief, and refer to it as another proof that the 
Indians are descendants of the children of Israel, as 
claimed in the Book of Mormon. 1 Says Elder Stebbins : 
"Their worship of Jehovah, calling him Yohewah, is 
itself a good assurance of their Hebrew origin." — Lec- 
tures, p. 244. 

But nothing can be further from the truth than this 
assertion, as all students of the native American religions 
know, for the Indian, using this term in its broadest sense 
as covering the tribes of both North and South America, 
knew absolutely nothing of the "Great Spirit" or the 
"Happy Hunting-ground" until he came under the 
preaching of the white missionary. Instead, he wor- 

1 The "Book of Mormon" tells us that the ancient Americans believed 
in this mythical being. "And then Ammon said, Believest thou that there 
is a Great Spirit? And he said, Yea. And Ammon said, This is God. 
And Ammon said unto him again, Believest thou that this Great Spirit, 
who is God, created all things which are in heaven and in the earth? And 
he said, Yea, I believe that he created all things which are in the earth; 
but I do not know the heavens" (Alma 12: 14). This is only another of 
those marks by which the human origin of the book is betrayed. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



39i 



shiped the wind, the earth, the sea, the waterfall, the sun, 
the volcano and deified animals and men. 

Says Parkman : "In no Indian language could the 
early missionaries find a word to express the idea of 
God. Manitou and Oki meant anything endowed with 
supernatural powers, from a snakeskin or a greasy In- 
dian conjurer up to Manabozho and Jouskeha." — The 
Jesuits in North America, p. 79. 

Says Brinton : "Of monotheism, either as displayed in 
the one personal, definite God of the Semitic races, or in 
the pantheistic sense of the Brahmins, there was not a 
single instance on the American continent." — Myths, p. 

69. 

Says Mrs. Erminnie A. Smith : "The 'Great Spirit/ 
so popularly and poetically known as the god of the 
red man, and the 'Happy Hunting-ground/ generally 
reported to be the Indian's idea of a future state, are 
both of them but their ready conception of the white 
man's God and Heaven. This is evident from a careful 
study of their past as gleaned from the numerous myths 
of their prehistoric existence." — Second Report Bureau 
American Ethnology, pp. 52, 53. 

Says Mooney : "In religion the Kiowa are polytheists 
and animists, deifying all the powers of nature and pray- 
ing to each in turn, according to the occasion. Their 
native system has no Great Spirit, no heaven, no hell, 
although they are now familiar with these ideas from 
contact with the whites ; their other world is a shadowy 
counterpart of this." — Seventeenth Report Bureau Amer- 
ican Ethnology, p. 237. 

Says Cushing of the Zunis : "That very little distinc- 
tion is made between these orders of life, or that they 
are at least closely related, seems to be indicated by the 
absence from the entire language of any general term 



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for God!' — Second Report Bureau American Ethnology, 
p. n. 

Says Major J. W. Powell : "Nations with civilized 
institutions, art with palaces, monotheism as the worship 
of the Great Spirit, all vanish from the priscan condi- 
tion of Xorth America in the light of anthropologic 
research. Tribes with the social institutions of kinship, 
art with its highest architectural development exhibited 
in the structure of communal dwellings, and polytheism 
in the worship of mythic animals and nature-gods re- 
main." — First Report Bureau American Ethnology, p. 69. 

Says Dellenbaugh : "They had no understanding of a 
single 'Great Spirit" till the Europeans, often uncon- 
sciously, informed them of their own belief." — North 
Americans of Yesterday, p. 375. 

The words for God in the American tongues origi- 
nally conveyed no idea of personality and unity, but sim- 
ply the mysterious, the incomprehensible, the wonderful 
and the unknown, and were often rendered into English 
by the vulgar term ''medicine." Brinton, in speaking of 
these words, says : "A word is usually found in their 
languages analogous to none in any European tongue, a 
word comprehending all manifestations of the unseen 
world, yet conveying no sense of personal unity. It has 
been rendered spirit, demon, God, devil, mystery, magic, 
but commonly and rather absurdly by the English and 
French 'medicine.' In the Aljonkin dialects this word 
is manito and oki, in Iroquois otkon, in the Hidatsa hopa; 
the Dakota has wakan, the Aztec tcotl, the Quichua 
huaca, and the Maya ku.'' — Myths, p. 62. A few years 
ago a young Pottawatamie informed me that their word 
manito might with equal propriety be applied to Jehovah 
or a rattlesnake, and when requested to give its exact 
meaning he replied wit*h a wave of the hand: "It means 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



393 



simply the wonderful, the mysterious, anything you can 
not understand." This word, as were also the others 
mentioned, was applied to the serpent that softly glided 
through the grass, to the conjurer who performed some 
trick the secret of which was not understood, to the noise 
in the forest the cause of which was unknown, to the 
power of the waterfall, to the cardinal points of the com- 
pass from whence come the showers, and, after the 
advent of the Europeans, to the white man's God, his 
spirit and his devil. Whatever the Indian could not 
understand was manito, wakan or otkon. 

Among nearly all the American tribes the gods were 
mythic animals and men and the elements and phenomena 
of nature. 

The dog, for instance, was the chief deity in the 
province of Huanca in Peru, and when the Inca Pacha- 
cutec carried his arms into that country he found its 
image installed in the temple as the supreme object of 
worship. Likewise in North America the coyote was 
worshiped by the Shoshones, who called it their ancestor, 
and the Nahuas paid it such high honor that they erected 
for it a temple of its own, with a large congregation of 
priests set apart to its service, carved its image in stone 
and gave it an elaborate funeral when dead. 1 Michabo, 
or the Great Hare, was worshiped by the Algonkin tribes 
as their common ancestor. Brinton says of him : "From 
the remotest wilds of the northwest to the coast of the 
Atlantic, from the southern boundaries of Carolina to 
the cheerless swamps of Hudson Bay, the Algonkins 
were never tired of gathering around the winter fire and 
repeating the story of Manibozho or Michabo, the Great 
Hare. With entire unanimity their various branches, the 



1 "Myths," pp. 160, 161. 



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Powhatans of Virginia, the Lenni Lenape of the Dela- 
ware, the warlike hordes of Xew England, the Ottawas 
of the far north, and the western tribes perhaps with- 
out exception, spoke of 'this chimerical beast/ as one of 
the old missionaries calls it, as their common ancestor. 
The totem or clan which bore his name was looked up 
to with peculiar respect.'' — Myths, p. 193. 

The serpent was the object of worship and respect 
among the Quiches. Their wind god Hurakan was other- 
wise called the Strong Serpent, who controlled the power 
of the storm. Such names as Ouetzalcoatl, Gucumatz 
and Kukulkan signify "Bird Serpent," and these gods 
were deities of the wind or air in Mexico, Guatemala 
and Yucatan. In Xorth America the rattlesnake was 
looked upon with special reverence by the Algonkins, 
Iroquois, Creeks, Cherokees and, in fact, most other 
tribes. It also appears extensively in the symbolisms of 
the Mound Builders. 1 

The bird was worshiped in all parts of America. In 
the northern continent the Algonkins attributed to it the 
making of the winds and claimed that the clouds were 
but the spreading of its wings, while in both Mexico and 
Peru there were colleges of augurs whose duty it was to 
divine the future by watching the course and interpreting 
songs of birds. The eagle was paid special honor by the 
Creeks, Cherokees, Dakotas, Xatchez, Arkansas and 
Zuni. The owl was the god of the dead with the Nahuas, 
Quiches, Mayas, Peruvians, Araucanians and Algonkins. 
And the dove was held in high repute by the Hurons, 
Mandans and Mexicans, who believed that it was inhab- 
ited by the souls of the dead. 2 

On the animal worship of the Indian tribes Powell 



1 "Myths," p. 130. 

2 "Myths," p. 129. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



395 



says : "Many of the Indians of North America, and many 
of South America, and many of the tribes of Africa, are 
found to be zootheists. Their supreme gods are animals 
— tigers, bears, wolves, serpents, birds." — First Report 
Bureau American Ethnology, p. 33. 

Says Dellenbaugh: "The religion of most of the 
Amerinds was zootheism — that is, their gods were deified 
men and animals." — North Americans of Yesterday, p. 
375- 

The Indians also worshiped the elements and phe- 
nomena of nature. The ancient Creeks worshiped the 
wind under the name of isakita immissi, "The Master of 
Breath." Since the advent of the missionary among them 
this term is applied to the true God. Parallel with this is 
the Choctaw hushtoli, "The Storm Wind," and the Chero- 
kee oonazvleh unggi, "The Eldest of the Winds." The 
Eskimo still pray to sillam innua, "Owner of the Winds," 
as the highest existence, and Brinton says of the four 
demigods that so frequently appear in the mythology of 
Central America, Mexico and Peru : "The ancient heroes 
and demigods, who, four in number, figure in all these 
antique traditions, were not men of flesh and blood, but 
the invisible currents of air who brought the fertilizing 
showers." — Myths, p. 97. 

The sun was originally worshiped in all parts of 
America. Bancroft says: "Brasseur de Bourbourg, 
Tylor, Squier and Schoolcraft agree in considering sun- 
worship the most radical religious idea of all civilized 
American religions." — Native Races, Vol. III., p. no. 

Mr. Lucian Carr says that "everywhere in the valley 
east of the Mississippi the Indian was a sun-worshiper. " 
■ — Report Smithsonian Institution (1891), p. 536- 

Mrs. Erminnie A. Smith says of the Iroquois: "The 
pagan Indians worship the sun, moon, stars, thunder, 



396 



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and other spirits rather vaguely defined." — Second Re- 
port Bureau American Ethnology, p. 112. 

Mooney says of the Kiowa: "The greatest of the 
Kiowa gods is the sun." — Seventeenth Report Bureau 
American Ethnology, p. 237. 

The Hurons claimed that their chiefs descended from 
the sun, and that the sacred pipe was presented by that 
luminary to the western Pawnees and was by them 
transmitted to the other tribes. The Mandans and Mini- 
tarees had a similar tradition. The Iroquois also wor- 
shiped the sun, as did also the Natchez, who erected 
temples and offered sacrifices in its honor. Of other 
tribes who held this luminary in special veneration are 
the Delawares, Osages, Sioux, Araucanians, Peruvians 
and Creeks. 1 

The semi-civilized tribes, w T ho were more advanced in 
their theistic ideas, had large pantheons. In addition to 
a worship of the sun, moon, stars and thunder, the Peru- 
vians invoked Papapconopa to insure a good harvest 
of sweet potatoes; Caullama, the protector of flocks; 
Chichic, the god of landed property, and Lacarvillca, the 
god of irrigation. The more ignorant also worshiped 
the condor, puma, owl and serpent and such products of 
the earth as maize and potatoes. By some even the dead 
were invoked as the protectors of the family. They 
offered flowers, incense and such animals as tapirs and 
serpents to their gods, and on special occasions a child 
or a virgin was slain before the image of the sun. 2 

The Mexicans also are to be specially noticed on ac- 
count of the size of their pantheon. Some have thought 
that their supreme god was Teotl, the " Supreme Creator 
and Lord of the Universe," but, on the contrary, Brinton 



1 "American Antiquities," pp. 352, 353. 

2 "Prehistoric America," pp. 436, 437. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



397 



and others hold that this term, like manito and wakan, 
was only an expression for the mysterious and supernat- 
ural and did not convey the idea of personality. But, be 
this as it may, below Teotl were other orders or gods, and 
this refutes the claim that they were monotheistic in their 
worship. ''Rightly does Wuttke contend," says J. G. 
Muller, "against any conception of this deity as a mono- 
theistic one, the polytheism of the people being consid- 
ered — for polytheism and monotheism will not be yoked 
together; even if a logical concordance were found, the 
inner spirits of the principles of the two would still be 
opposed to each other." — Native Races, Vol. III., p. 183. 

Prescott says : "The Aztecs recognized the existence 
of a supreme Creator and Lord of the universe. But 
the idea of unity — of a being, with whom volition is 
action, who has no need of inferior ministers to execute 
his purposes — was too simple, or too vast, for their 
understandings ; and they sought relief, as usual, in a 
plurality of deities, who presided over the elements, the 
changes of the seasons, and the various occupations of 
man. Of these there were thirteen principal deities, and 
more than two 'hundred inferior; to each of whom some 
special day, or appropriate festival, was consecrated." — 
Conquest of Mexico, Vol. I., p. 57. 

Gallatin says : "Their mythology, as far as we know 
it, presents a great number of unconnected gods, without 
apparent system or unity of design. It exhibits no evi- 
dence of metaphysical research or imaginative powers. 
Viewed only as a development of the intellectual faculties 
of man, it is in every respect vastly inferior to the relig- 
ious systems of Egypt, India, Greece or Scandinavia. If 
imported, it must have been from some barbarous coun- 
try, and brought directly from such country to Mexico, 
since no traces of a similar worship are found in the 



398 



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more northern parts of America." — Native Races, Vol. 
III., p. 1 86. 

And, recollect, the Mexican system was the most 
highly developed of any on the American continent; yet, 
in the face of all this, we are coolly met with the as- 
sertion that the Indian, "in all parts,'' was a worshiper of 
the Great Spirit of Jehovah. 

Yiscomte de Bussiere says : "The population of Cen- 
tral America, although they had preserved the vague 
notion of a superior eternal God and creator, known by 
the name of Teotl, had an Olympus as numerous as that 
of the Greeks and the Romans." — Native Races, Vol. 
III., p. 187. 

Next to Teotl, the principal god of the Aztecs, if a 
god at all, comes Tezcatlipoca, "Shining Mirror," who 
was regarded as the creator of heaven and earth and the 
rewarder of the just and punisher of evil-doers. The 
god of the dead was Mictlanhuatl, "Rational Owl," with 
whom was associated the goddess Mictlancihuatl. Ome- 
teuchtli, "Twice Lord," and Omecihuatl, "Twice Wo- 
man," were divinities who watched over the world from 
an enchanted city in the heavens. The sun and moon 
were deified under the names Tonathiu and Meztli. 
Quetzalcoatl, "Feathered Serpent," was their god of the 
air. The Aztec Xeptune was Tlaloc, and their terrible 
god of war was Huitzilopochtli, or Mexitli, whose altars 
so often ran with Spanish blood at the time of the Con- 
quest. These are only a few of the more important of 
the Mexican divinities. 

The chief divinities of the Mayas were Hunab Ku, 
"The Only God," the Supreme Being, the Creator, the 
Invisible One ; Ixazaluoh, his spouse, goddess of weav- 
ing; Itzamna, "Dew of the Morning," the personification 
of the East or Rising Sun; Kukulkan, the Mayan Quet- 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



399 



zalcoatl, the personification of the West or Setting Sun ; 
Kin Ich", their divinity of Noontide; Ix Kan Leom, "The 
Spider Web," goddess of medicine and childbirth ; the 
Bacabs, her four sons, gods of the four cardinal points ; 
Yum Chac, god of rain; Yum Kaak, god of harvest; 
Cum Ahau, "Lord of the Vase;" Zuhuy Kak, "Virgin 
Fire," patroness of infants ; Zuhuy Dzip, "Virgin of 
Dressed Animals," their goddess of hunting; Ix Tabai, 
another hunting goddess and goddess of those who 
hanged themselves, etc. 1 "The Mayas," says Bancroft, 
"were not behind their neighbors in the number of their 
lesser and special divinities, so that there was scarcely an 
animal or imaginary creature which they did not repre- 
sent by sacred images." — Native Races, Vol. III., p. 463. 

I am sure that the above-given facts are sufficient to 
convince the reader that his long-cherished conception of 
the Indian's deity as the "Great Spirit" is groundless, 
and also that they are sufficient to convince him that the 
theistic conceptions of the American Indian were of the 
crudest type, closely connecting him with the forms, ele- 
ments and phenomena of that nature with which he was 
familiar. 

On the whole continent there are only two instances 
where the worship of an immaterial god was instituted: 
among the Quichuas of Peru and the Nahuas of Tezcuco. 
These, Brinton says, "as the highest conquests of Ameri- 
can natural religions deserve special mention." A careful 
study of the circumstances connected with the institution 
of this form of worship in these countries shows that it 
was not a belief handed down from generation to gener- 
ation from ages long past, nor yet a development out of 
the old religions, but a truth unconsciously stumbled on 



1 "Mayan Primer," p. 37. 



400 



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to by two men who found these religions inadequate to 
satisfy the longings of the human heart and the reason- 
ings of the human mind. 

The monotheistic worship of Peru was instituted by 
the Inca Yupanqui, who in 1440, before a grand religious 
council held at the dedication of the Temple of the Sun, 
is said to have made the following address : "Many say 
that the sun is the maker of all things. But he who 
makes should abide by what he has made. Now, many 
things happen when the sun is absent; therefore he can 
not be the universal creator. And that he is alive at all 
is doubtful, for his trips do not tire him. Were he a 
living thing, he would grow weary like ourselves ; were 
he free, he would visit other parts of the heavens. He is 
like a tethered beast who makes a daily round under the 
eye of a master; he is like an arrow, which must go 
whither it is sent, not whither it wishes. I tell you that 
he, our Father and Master the Sun, must have a lord and 
master more powerful than himself, who constrains him 
to his daily circuit without pause or rest." — Myths, p. 72. 

The other instance of the introduction of monothe- 
istic ideas into the native religion was in Tezcuco. Nez- 
ahuatl, the lord of that country, had long besought his 
gods to give him a son to inherit his throne, but to no 
avail. At last in despair he is said to have exclaimed: 
"Verily, these gods that I am adoring, what are they but 
idols of stone without speech or feeling? They could 
not have made the beauty of the heaven, the sun, the 
moon and the stars which adorn it, and which light the 
earth with its countless streams, its fountains and waters, 
its trees and plants, and its various inhabitants. There 
must be some god, invisible and unknown, who is the 
universal creator. He alone can console me in my afflic- 
tion and take away my sorrow." — Myths, p. 73, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



401 



In both of these countries temples are said to have 
been erected to this unknown god and his worship insti- 
tuted, but not to the exclusion of the worship of the other 
gods, for in both sections the old deities continued to 
receive the same adoration as before, and when the Span- 
iards entered Peru they not only found temples to these 
deities, but they also found the temple of the new god 
polluted by a hideous image set up within it, before 
which the votaries paid their devotions, and by hideous 
paintings on the walls. 

There is not a particle of evidence to show that the 
American race ever held to the belief in a single Great 
Spirit analogous to the God of the Jewish and Christian 
religions, all reports to the contrary being misrepresenta- 
tions. On the contrary, their gods were spirits, deified 
animals and men and the forms, elements and phenomena 
of nature, and, if we may judge by their myths, carvings 
and paintings, they never had any other. 

THE MAYAN TRINITY. 

It is contended by Lord Kingsborough that the Mayas 
worshiped a Trinity composed of Father, Son and Holy 
Ghost. He gets his information from Torquemada, De 
Salcar and other early Spanish writers. His quotation 
from De Salcar is as follows: "The chiefs and men of 
rank in the province of Chiapa were acquainted with the 
doctrine of the most holy Trinity. They called the 
Father Icona, the Son Bacab, and the Holy Ghost Estru- 
ach; and certainly these names resemble the Hebrew, 
especially Estruach that of the Holy Ghost does, for 
Ruach in Hebrew is the Holy Ghost." — Book of Mormon 
Lectures, pp. 238, 239. He claims that, according to this 
tradition, Bacab was born of a virgin, Chibirias, and was 
afterwards put to death by Eopuco, who scourged him, 



402 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



put a crown of thorns upon his head and crucified him 
by tying him to a cross. He claims further that the 
tradition states that after being dead three days he came 
to life and ascended to the Father, following which 
Estruach came and filled the earth with whatever it stood 
in need of. 

This tradition is readily accepted by the Mormons, 
who give it wide publicity in their works as confirming 
their belief that the ancient Americans were worshipers 
of the true God. Dr. James E. Talmadge, in his "Two 
Lectures on the Book of Mormon," p. 36, says : "Many 
traditions and some records, telling of the predestined 
Christ and his atoning death, were current among the 
native races of this continent long prior to the advent of 
Christian discoverers in recent centuries. Indeed, when 
the Spaniards first invaded Mexico, their Catholic priests 
found a native knowledge of Christ and the Godhead, so 
closely corresponding with the doctrines of orthodox 
Christianity, that they, in their inability to account for 
the same, invented the theory that Satan had planted 
among the natives of the country an imitation gospel for 
the purpose of deluding the people." Following this he 
gives the foregoing tradition of the Trinity. Mr. Steb- 
bins also devotes several pages of his "Book of Mormon 
Lectures" to this and similar traditions. 

But that such a myth ever existed in the traditional 
lore of the natives is positively impossible. This was 
discovered long ago by the students of American tradi- 
tions, and these stories were given up as spurious. This 
account, then, was either invented by the natives them- 
selves in order to make their beliefs appear to conform 
to the Christian, or else it was invented by. the Catholic 
priests. In speaking of it, Short says : "In fact, the story 
is the Apostles' Creed without the 'Credo/ and is prob- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



403 



ably as much the work of the credulous and imaginative 
Spanish Fathers as of the designing natives. The story 
ought to be repudiated without question." — North Amer- 
icans of Antiquity, p. 231. 

And Bancroft disposes of it in these words : "The 
inquiries instituted by Las Casas revealed the existence 
of a trinity, the first person of which was Izona, the 
Great Father; the second was the son of the Great 
Father, Bacab, born of the virgin Chibirias, scourged 
and crucified, he descended into the realms of the dead, 
rose again the third day, and ascended into heaven; the 
third person of the trinity was Echuah, or Ekchuah, the 
Holy Ghost. Now, to accuse the reverend Fathers of 
deliberately concocting this and other statements of a 
similar character is to accuse them of acts of charlatan- 
ism which no religious zeal could justify. On the other 
hand, that this mysterious trinity, this Maya Christ 
myth, had any real existence in the original belief of the 
natives, is so improbable as to be almost impossible. It 
may be, however, that the natives, when questioned con- 
cerning their religion, endeavored to make it conform as 
nearly as possible to that of their conquerors, hoping by 
this means to gain the good will of their masters, and to 
lull suspicions of lurking idolatry. Bacab, stated above 
to mean the Son of the Great Father, was in reality the 
name of four spirits who supported the firmament ; 
while Echuah, or the Holy Ghost, was the patron god of 
merchants and travelers." — Native Races, Vol. III., pp. 
462, 463. 

The names of the four Bacabs, as given by Brinton, 
are: Hobnil, Canzicnal, Zaczini and Hozan ek. They 
stood, respectively, for the cardinal points, south, east, 
north and west; for the days, Kan, Muluc, Ix and 
Cauac; for the elements, air, fire, water and earth; and 



404 



CUMOKAH REVISITED 



were represented by the colors, yellow, red, white and 
black. 1 Their mother was not Chibirias, but Ix Kan 
Leom, "The Spider Web," the goddess of medicine and 
childbirth. On Ek Chua, "The Black Companion," Brin- 
ton remarks : "God of the cacao planters and the mer- 
chants, as these used the cacao beans as a medium of 
exchange." — Mayan Primer, p. 42. So this fanciful 
theory of an Indian trinity falls to the ground, and the 
Book of Mormon loses one more of its choice "collateral 
evidences." 

WAS OUETZALCOATL JESUS CHRIST? 

Another very absurd theory is that which identifies 
our Lord with Ouetzalcoatl, the Aztec god of the air. 
Kingsborough is the most prominent advocate of this 
opinion. He claims that in a certain piece of ancient 
sculpture work, discovered in Mexico by Mons. Dupaix, 
this god is represented as wearing a crown of thorns, 
that in a bust now preserved in the British Museum he 
holds in his hand a fan and a sickle, and that in the 
Borgian manuscript he is represented, pictographically, as 
dying upon a cross between two reviling thieves. Put- 
ting these evidences together, he decides that the Ameri- 
cans knew of the crucifixion of our Lord upon the cross 
of Calvary. 

On the supposed representation of the crucifixion of 
Quetzalcoatl, as given in the Borgian manuscript, he 
says: "In the fourth page of the Borgian manuscript, he 
seems to be crucified between two persons, who are in 
the act of reviling him ; who hold, as it would appear, 
halters in their hands, the symbols, perhaps, of some 
crime for which they were themselves going to suffer." 



1 "Mayan Primer," p. 41. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



405 



— Quoted in Book of Mormon Lectures, p. 239. He 
says further that in the seventy-second, seventy-third 
and seventy-fifth pages, as well as in the fourth page, of 
this manuscript, are paintings "which actually represent 
Quecalcoatle crucified and nailed to the cross." 

The Mormons have eagerly seized these quotations, 
with others from the same author, and give them wide 
publicity as proving that the ancient Americans knew 
of the crucifixion of Christ. "When we read of these 
evidences," writes Elder Stebbins, "we see the very char- 
acter and work of Jesus Christ, and also his suffer- 
ing, presented to us." — Lectures, p. 241. And on the 
bust of Quetzalcoatl, in which that god is holding a fan 
and a sickle, he says : "We can see the meaning of the 
fan and the sickle, for it is written of Christ, 'Whose 
fan is in his hand;' and when he shall come again he 
shall come with the sickle, as shown in Rev. 14: 14-19." 
— Lectures, p. 240. The Brighamites, also, have not 
spoken in uncertain terms on the identity of the Lord 
with this Mexican deity. Says Elder John Taylor: "The 
story of the life of the Mexican divinity, Quetzalcoatl, 
closely resembles that of the Saviour; so closely, indeed, 
that we can come to no other conclusion than that Quet- 
zalcoatl and Christ are* the same being." — Mediation and 
Atonement, p. 201. 

But this belief rests, not upon acknowledged facts, 
but upon certain inferences drawn from the statuary and 
paintings of the country, and that, too, by Lord Kings- 
borough, a writer half crazed and fanatical. No archae- 
ologist of reputation holds to this theory at the present 
time, for upon a comparison of it with the evidences 
upon which it is based its ridiculousness is made appar- 
ent at once. While Mormon writers make good use of his 
statements, they are very careful that the public shall not 



406 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



see the figures from the Codex Borgianus, which Kings- 
borough claims are representations of Quetzalcoatl cru- 
cified. In 1888 a prominent Josephite elder went to the 
Cincinnati Exposition, where a set of Kingsborough was 
on exhibition, and copied a number of extracts from it 
relative to the character, work and death of this god. 
These extracts were published the following year in the 
Josephite magazine, Autumn Leaves, and afterwards in 
"Book of Mormon Lectures," "Divinity of the Book of 
Mormon Proven by Archaeology," and other Mormon 
works. But why did this elder, after he had put himself 
to so much trouble to see a set of Kingsborough's "Mex- 
ican Antiquities," not sketch, or have sketched, the fig- 
ures which the latter claims represent the crucifixion 
scene of Quetzalcoatl? The reason is obvious. He knew 
full well that a glance at these pictographs would for- 
ever destroy the force of Kingsborough's claim with 
every unbiased reader and the Book of Mormon would 
lose some highly valued evidence. 

Although Kingsborough's work is very rare and ex- 
pensive, being long out of print, I have succeeded in 
locating three sets : one in Cambridge, Mass. ; another 
in the library of the State Historical Society of Wis- 
consin, at Madison, and still another in the library of the 
Field's Museum, Chicago. Through the kindness of the 
librarian of the last-mentioned institution, I was permit- 
ted to sketch the figures on pages 4 and 75 of the "Bor- 
gian Codex." The pictograph on page 4 (Fig. 12) of 
this manuscript is the one which Kingsborough declares 
represents Quetzalcoatl crucified "between two persons 
who are in the act of reviling him ; and who hold, as it 
would appear, halters in their hands, the symbols, per- 
haps, of some crime for which they were themselves go- 
ing to suffer;" while the one from page 75 (Fig. 13) is 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



407 



also said to represent a crucifixion scene. The picto- 
graphs on pages 72 and 73 I was unable to sketch, be- 
cause of their complexity, but they no more suggest a 
crucifixion scene than they do the surrender of General 
Lee at Appomattox. Those that I have been so fortu- 
nate as to obtain comprise only one- fourth of the pages 
from which they are taken, there being three other 




FIGURE i2. "QUETZALCOATL CRUCIFIED." Page 4, Borgian Codex. 

groups on each page, the whole arranged in the form of 
a quadrilateral. I ask the reader to examine carefully 
the drawings given, and then to decide for himself how 
much of truth there is in the claim that they represent 
a crucifixion scene. 

Outside of Kingsborough, no archaeologist of promi- 



4o8 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



nence has ever been able to see the identity between our 
Lord and Quetzalcoatl. Clavigero thinks that the latter 
was a real person, who, after his departure from Cho- 
lula, was apotheosized and made a god; Tylor identifies 
him with the sun ; De Bourbourg holds that he was the 




FIGURE 13. "QUETZALCOATL CRUCIFIED." Page 75, Borgian Codex. 



symbol of an ancient religion; and Brinton contends that 
he was only the personification of the dawn. 1 On the 
utter absence of such a character as Christ in the myth- 
ologies and religions of America, Rev. S. D. Peet says : 
"The most striking analogy between the religious sys- 



1 Bancroft, III: 260-267. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



409 



terns of America and those which existed in the far East, 
consists in the fact that there was a constant progress, 
and the conception of Divinity grew higher as civil- 
ization advanced; and yet, strange to say, no such char- 
acter ever appeared on the continent of America, as that 
which was embodied in the person of Jesus Christ." — 
Myths and Symbols or Aboriginal Religions (Introduc- 
tion). 

That the reader may decide for himself whether or 
not there is anything in the character and life of Quet- 
zalcoatl to identify him with Jesus Christ, I here give the 
commonly received tradition of him : 

"The god of the air, among all the nations of Ana- 
huac, was called Quetzalcoatl ; that is to say, 'serpent 
decked with feathers.' It was related that he had been 
a high priest of Tollan, and that he was a man with a 
white skin, a high stature, a broad forehead, large eyes, 
long, black hair and a bushy beard. For propriety's sake, 
he always wore ample garments ; he was so rich that he 
possessed palaces of silver and fine stones. Industrious, 
he had invented the arts of smelting metals and of work- 
ing stone. The laws which he had given men proved his 
knowledge, and his austere life his wisdom. When he 
wished to promulgate a law, he sent a hero whose voice 
could be heard a hundred leagues away, to proclaim it 
from the summit of Tzatzitepetl (mountain of clamors). 

"In the time of Quetzalcoatl, maize attained such 
enormous dimensions that a single ear was all a man 
could carry. Gourds measured not less than four feet, 
and it was no longer necessary to dye cotton, because all 
colors were produced by nature. The other products of 
the earth naturally attained dimensions similar to those of 
Indian corn; singing-birds and birds of brilliant plumage 
abounded. All men were then rich. In a word, the 



4io 



CUMOKAH REVISITED 



Aztecs believed that the reign of Quetzalcoatl had been 
the golden age of the country they inhabited. 

"Like the Saturn of the Greeks, with whom we may 
compare him, the god of Toltec origin abandoned his 
country. When its prosperity was at its height, Tezcat- 
lipoca, for some unknown reason, appeared to him in the 
form of an old man, and revealed to him that the will 
of the gods ordained that he should betake himself to the 
kingdom of Tlapallan. At the same time he offered him 
a beverage by means of which Quetzalcoatl believed he 
might acquire immortality. But he had scarcely swal- 
lowed the draught when he was seized with such an 
irresistible desire to repair to Tlapallan that he immedi- 
ately set out, escorted by a number of his followers, sing- 
ing hymns. Near the village of Cuauhtitlan, Quetzal- 
coatl threw a number of stones against a tree, which 
adhered to the trunk. Xear Tlanepantla he placed his 
hand on a rock, which preserved the impression of it — 
an imprint which the Mexicans showed to the Spaniards 
after the Conquest. 

"Finally, when Quetzalcoatl reached Cholula, the in- 
habitants of that city conferred the supreme power on 
him. The integrity of his life, the gentleness of his 
manners, his repugnance to every species of cruelty, won 
the hearts of the Cholulans. From him they learned how 
to smelt metals — an art which afterwards rendered them 
celebrated. For a long time they obeyed the laws he 
gave them. To Quetzalcoatl they attribute the rites of 
their religion and their knowledge of the division of 
time. 

"After a sojourn of twenty years at Cholula, Quet- 
zalcoatl resolved to continue his journey towards the 
imaginary city of Tlapallan, taking with him four young 
nobles. Having arrived in the province of Ooatzacoalco, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



411 



he discharged his followers, and charged them to tell the 
Cholulans that he would shortly return to them. The 
Cholulans confided the government of their city to the 
mandatories of their benefactor in memory of the friend- 
ship he had for them. Gradually the report of the death 
of Quetzalcoatl spread; he was then proclaimed god by 
the Toltecs of Cholula, and afterwards declared pro- 
tector of their city, in the center of which they raised in 
his honor a high mountain, which they crowned with a 
temple. From Cholula the worship of Quetzalcoatl, ven- 
erated as the god of the air, extended over the whole 
country." — Briarfs Aztecs, pp. 1 19-122. 

In this account nothing is said of the crucifixion of 
Quetzalcoatl, and the inference is that he died a natural 
death. I think that the reader will readily see that the 
theory that Quetzalcoatl was Jesus Christ is founded 
wholly upon Kingsbo rough's inferences drawn from the 
paintings and carvings of the country, and not upon any 
authentic tradition. 

THE INDIAN DEVIL. 

The Book of Mormon, like the Bible, teaches the 
existence of a devil, the "Prince of Darkness," a being 
morally antithetical to God. It declares that a belief in 
the existence of this being was held by the ancient races 
of the continent, and Mormons insist that it was still en- 
tertained among the natives at the time of their first con- 
tact with Europeans. 

But this opinion is untrue. No such being as the 
devil of the Christian religion appears in the mythologies 
of America. Those gods called "devils" by the early 
missionaries and travelers were, in fact, only their gods 
of the underworld — Plutos, not devils. The most com- 
petent students of the native religions tell us that the 



4 I2 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



American tribes did not divide their gods into morally 
antithetical classes ; that is, according to their goodness 
and badness. The Indian's conception of good and evil 
differed vastly from ours. To him those gods who sent 
the sunshine and the rain, gave him good crops and 
stocked the forests with game and the streams with fish 
were good ; those who sent the frost to kill the corn, dis- 
ease to destroy the people and calamity in general were 
bad. To him the manifestations of deity were physical, 
not moral, manifestations. 

Says Parkman : "In the primitive Indian's conception 
of a God the idea of moral good has no part. His deity 
does not dispense justice for this world or the next, but 
leaves mankind under the power of subordinate spirits, 
who fill and control the universe. Xor is the good and 
evil of these inferior beings a moral good and evil. The 
good spirit is the spirit that gives good luck, and min- 
isters to the necessities and desires of mankind; the evil 
spiritTs simply a malicious agent of disease, death and 
mischance." — The Jesuits in Xorth America, p. 78. 

On this point Brinton, speaking comprehensively of 
all the tribes, says: "The various deities of the Indians, 
it may safely be said in conclusion, present no stronger 
antithesis in this respect than those of ancient Greece 
and Rome. Some gods favored man and others hurt 
him ; some, like the forces they embodied, were benef- 
icent to him, others injurious. But no ethical contrast, 
beyond what this would imply, existed to the native 
mind." — Myths of the New World, p. 82. 

Father Bruyas, in translating the word "devil" into 
Iroquois, had to use the word otkon, their word for the 
supernatural, which he elsewhere used as the equiva- 
lent of our word "spirit." Father Rogel, in 1570, told 
some of the tribes of Georgia that the deity they wor- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



413 



shiped was a demon, which made them so indignant that 
they left him to preach to the winds after explaining that, 
instead of a wicked being, he was the god who sent all 
good things. It has been declared that the Algonkins of 
New England worshiped a good deity called Kiehtan, and 
an evil one, Hobbamock, "who," says Winslow, "as farre 
as we can conceive, is the Devill." The former is simply 
the word for "great," with a final n, and is thought to be 
an abbreviation of Kittanitowit, the great manito, in- 
vented by the whites, and "not the appellation of any per- 
sonified deity." And the latter, instead of being the 
"Devill," is, according to Winslow's own statement, "the 
kindly god who cured diseases, aided them in the chase, 
and appeared to them in dreams as their protector," and 
is said by Dr. Jarvis to be "the oke or tutelary deity which 
each Indian worships." The deity Juripari, of certain 
tribes in Brazil, said to be their evil spirit, turns out to be 
only their name for the supernatural in general. The 
deity Aka-kanet, of the Araucanians, declared to be their 
"father of evil," is, instead, the benign power throned 
in the Pleiades, who sends fruit and flowers and is ad- 
dressed by them as "grandfather." Cupay of the Peru- 
vians was not "the shadowy embodiment of evil," as 
Prescott claims, but was their god of the dead, analogous 
to Pluto of the Greek and Mictlantecutli of the Mexican 
mythology. Loskiel, a Moravian missionary among the 
Lenape, says that "the idea of a devil, a prince of dark- 
ness, they first received in later times through the Euro- 
peans." Dr. Matthews says of the Hidatsa : "The Hi- 
datsa believe neither in a hell nor a devil." Rev. G. H. 
Pond says of the Dakotas : "I have never been able to 
discover from the Dakotas themselves the least degree 
of evidence that they divide the gods into classes of good 
and evil, and am persuaded that those persons who repre- 



414 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



sent them as doing so do it inconsiderately, and because 
it is so natural to subscribe to a long-cherished popular 
opinion." 1 Gatchet says of the Creeks: "The idea that 
the Creeks knew anything of the devil of the Christian 
religion is a pure invention of the missionaries." 2 The 
Iroquois deity Hinu, which- Morgan 3 says was their 
"Evil Spirit," was, in fact, only their "beneficent Thun- 
der God," whose mission was "only to promote the wel- 
fare of that favored people, though isolated personal 
offenses might demand from him a just retribution." 4 
The lack of any moral differentiation between the 
American deities is only another of those marks by which 
the American religions are classed with the inferior re- 
ligions of the world. It disproves the claim that their 
ancestors were Jews and Christians. 

THE AMERICAN CROSS. 

The veneration of the cross among the nations of the 
New World is held up as further proof that the Ameri- 
cans knew of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. "Another 
evidence in favor of the Book of Mormon," says Apostle 
Blair, "is seen in the fact that it teaches, in Alma 16: 26, 
and in Ether 1 : 11, and elsewhere, that the ancient inhab- 
itants of America knew concerning the crucifixion of 
Christ, both by revelation and by history, and were there- 
fore acquainted with the cross as a religious symbol ; and 
in the further fact that the antiquities of America dis- 
close that the cross was so used by the ancients." — Joseph 
the Seer, p. 163. 

That the cross appears among the symbolisms of 

1 "Myths," pp. 75-79- 

2 "Migration Legend of the Creeks," Vol. I., p. 216. 

3 "Ancient Society," p. 117. 

* "Second Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 52. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



415 



America is not denied, but that it has here the same 
significance that it has among Christian nations is most 
seriously objected to. Marquette found a large cross set 
up in an Indian village on Green Bay, a symbol of the 
Mide society. On a skeleton discovered in a mound near 
Zollicoffer Hill, Tennessee, was found a peculiarly 
shaped copper ornament surmounted with a cross, and 
crosses have been taken from a mound near Chillicothe, 
Ohio, and from one in the Cumberland Valley ; but the 
fact that some of the mounds in all of these sections have 
been erected within post-Columbian times makes the an- 
tiquity of these relics uncertain. But of the antiquity of 
the symbol of the cross at Cuzco, on the Cozumel Island, 
Yucatan, in the bas-reliefs of Palenque and in the 
Codices of Central America and Mexico, there can be no 
doubt. The question before us is, Does the existence of 
the cross among the antiquities of America prove that 
the ancient Americans knew of Christ's crucifixion? 

In the first place, the cross, even as used by Oriental 
nations, is not exclusively a Christian emblem, and so the 
American cross, if brought from the Old World at all, 
may have been brought from some heathen country and 
at a time before the crucifixion of our Lord. The cross 
appears on the oldest monuments of Egypt as the symbol 
of eternal life It was a religious emblem among the 
Phoenicians, whose goddess, Astarte, was commonly fig- 
ured bearing a Latin cross. One of the old Assyrian 
kings is represented on a monument at Nineveh as wear- 
ing around his neck the four sacred symbols, the cres- 
cent, the star or sun, the trident and the cross. While in 
China it stood as the symbol of conception long before 
the beginning of the Christian era. 

But there is no need of looking to the Old World for 
the derivation of the American cross. It is a simple 



4i6 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



figure, easily made, on account of which it is not to be 
wondered at that it appears in the symbolisms of the 
ancient nations of this continent along with the circle, 
square and other simple figures. But there is, however, 
one indisputable fact connected with its use on this con- 
tinent: it conveyed to the native mind no such signifi- 
cance as it conveys to ours, but stood universally as the 
symbol of the four cardinal points, or of the four winds 
that bring the fertilizing showers. On its significance 
among the tribes of Yucatan one of the old chroniclers 
says: "Those of Yucatan prayed to the cross as the god 
of rains when they needed water." And Las Casas tells 
us that the natives of Chiapas erected altars in the form 
of the cross near their principal springs. When the 
Muyscas sacrificed to the goddess of waters they ex- 
tended strings across some sacred lake, at right angles 
and in the direction of the four cardinal points, and at 
the point of intersection made their offerings of precious 
stones and precious oils. In time of drought the Lenape 
conjurer went to some secluded place, drew a cross on 
the ground, with its arms pointing toward the four car- 
dinal points, and, after placing a piece of tobacco or some 
other offering on the point of intersection, cried aloud to 
the spirits of rain for relief. The Blackfeet honored 
their wind-god by arranging boulders on the prairies in 
the form of a cross. And the Creeks, on the occasion of 
their puskita, honored the four winds by making a cross 
of four logs extending in the four cardinal directions, 
and making new fire by friction at the point where they 
came together. 

On the significance of the Mexican cross Brinton 
says: "It represented the god of rains and of health, and 
this was everywhere its simple meaning." — Myths of the 
New World, p. 114. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



4i7 



Bancroft remarks: "With the Mexicans the cross was 
a symbol of rain, the fertilizing element, or, rather, of 
the four winds, the bearers of rain." — Native Races, Vol. 
III., p. 469. 

And, in speaking of the cross in the. Walam Olum 
and other American records, Peet says : "In these various 
records the circle was the symbol of the sun, the cross 
was the symbol of the winds, the square was the symbol 
of the four quarters of the sky, and the crescent the 
symbol of the moon." — Myths and Symbols, p. 186. 

This is its true meaning in ancient American symbol- 
ism ; we need look for no other. 

THE AMERICAN PRIESTHOODS. 

Latter-day Saints declare that there are certain fea- 
tures observed in the priesthoods of America which 
strongly suggest the Jewish. Says Elder Phillips': "High 
priests were a Jewish institution, and were also had in 
America according to the Book of Mormon; this Ban- 
croft confirms ; also Donnelly says : 'The priesthood was 
thoroughly organized in Mexico and Peru. They were 
prophets as well as priests.' " — Book of Mormon Veri- 
fied, p. 23. No Mormon will insist, however, that the 
American priesthoods, at the time of the Discovery, were 
exactly like the Jewish, but only that they bore certain 
marks by which the former existence of Judaism and 
Christianity may be proved. Their theory is that in the 
apostasy of the Lamanites some of the beliefs and insti- 
tutions of Judaism and Christianity were retained and 
have come down to us in a more or less mutilated con- 
dition mingled with heathen superstitions. 

But the mere fact that both peoples had priests proves 
nothing as to their relationship, for the same may be said 
for all nations, kindreds, tongues and peoples. The fact 



4i8 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



is, however, that the American priestly systems partook 
more of the nature of the priestly systems of Africa and 
Polynesia than they did of those of the Jews and Chris- 
tians. This will be observed as we pass on. 

In the first place, as distinguishing the American 
priesthoods from the Hebrew, we find the priests of our 
native tribes officiating at the altars of heathen gods. 
Those of Mexico attended upon the worship of Tezcatli- 
poca, Quetzalcoatl, Centeotl, Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc, 
gods with few of the attributes of Jehovah, to whom 
they offered sacrifices and said prayers. In Yucatan they 
served such gods as Kukulkan, Zamna and Kin Ich, while 
in Peru they officiated at the altars of the sun, moon and 
other deities. It is estimated that the whole number of 
idolatrous priests in Mexico was close to one million, five 
thousand of whom officiated in the great temple of the 
capital. 

In the second place, the American priesthoods dif- 
fered widely from the Hebrew and Christian in struc- 
ture. Among the Algonkins there were three orders of 
priests, the wabeno, mide and jossakced. The last no 
white man could enter. At the head of the Aztec hier- 
archial system stood the Teotecuhtli, "divine lord," who 
superintended the secular affairs, and the Hueiteopixqui, 
"high priest," who had charge of all religious matters. 
Next below these was the Mexicatlteohuatzin, a sort of 
'vicar-general, appointed to look after the public worship, 
the priesthood and the schools throughout the kingdom. 
He was assisted by two coadjutors, the Huitzuahuacteo- 
huatzin and the Tepantehuatzin. Below these stood the 
Topiltzin, the chief sacrificer, and his five assistants : the 
Tlalquimiloltecuhtli, keeper of relics and ornaments ; the 
Ometochtli, composer of hymns ; the Tlapixcatzin, musi- 
cal director; the Epcoaquacuiltzin, master of ceremonies; 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



419 



and a number of other dignitaries of less degree. The 
priesthoods of Yucatan and Peru were equally as com- 
plex. 

In the third place, the American priests offered hu- 
man sacrifices and sometimes ate human flesh, practices 
that connect them with the lowest forms of religion. 
Historians differ as to the number of human sacrifices 
offered in Mexico every year. A safe estimate is twenty 
thousand. These victims were mostly prisoners of war, 
but in some instances parents offered their children, even, 
that their gods might not fail of being served. It is 
asserted that certain Central American nations waged 
war for the ostensible purpose of obtaining sacrifices for 
their altars, and this assertion seems well founded. Just 
when the practice of offering human sacrifices was intro- 
duced no one can tell, but it is certain that it dates from 
pre-Toltec times, although it is said that the Toltecs 
under Quetzalcoatl broke away from it. 

In the fourth place, the American priests were nec- 
romancers, clairvoyants, mesmerists and adepts in occult- 
ism. These, again, are marks, not of either Judaism or 
Christianity, but of paganism. A number of these prac- 
tices are described in "Myths of the New World," by 
Brinton. 

There is nothing whatever to show that the priestly 
idea in the native American religions came from the 
Jewish or Christian. On the contrary, the American 
priesthoods were, in organization and practice, connected 
with the lower religious systems of the world. 

RITES AND CEREMONIES. 

When the Spanish priests first came to Mexico they 
found certain rites, ceremonies and institutions which 
strongly reminded them of certain of the rites, ceremo- 



420 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



nies and institutions of the Jews and Christians. Among 
these were baptism, auricular confession, the celebration 
of the eucharist, circumcision, the laying on of hands and 
penance, and from the descriptions that they have left 
one would suppose that the ancient Americans were very 
good Roman Catholics. The missionaries accounted for 
these similarities either upon the supposition that the 
gospel had been preached here by St. Thomas in the first 
century, or that these similarities to the Jewish and 
Christian religions were the inventions of the devil for 
the purpose of deception. 

In speaking of these supposed analogies to the Chris- 
tian faith, Prescott says: "We should have charity for 
the missionaries who first landed in this world of won- 
ders ; where, while man and nature wore so strange an 
aspect, they were astonished by occasional glimpses of 
rites and ceremonies which reminded them of a pure 
faith. In their amazement, they did not reflect whether 
these things were not the natural expression of the relig- 
ious feeling common to all nations who have reached 
even a moderate civilization. They did not inquire 
whether the same things w T ere not practiced by other 
idolatrous people They could not suppress their wonder 
as they beheld the cross, the sacred emblem of their own 
faith, raised as an object of worship in the temples of 
Anahuac. They met with it in various places ; and the 
image of a cross may be seen at this day, sculptured 
in bas-relief, on the walls of one of the buildings of 
Palenque, while a figure bearing some resemblance to 
that of a child is held up to it, as if in adoration. 

"Their surprise was heightened when they witnessed 
a religious rite which reminded them of the Christian 
communion. On these occasions an image of the tutelary 
deity of the Aztecs was made of the flour of maize, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



421 



mixed with blood, and, after consecration by the priests, 
was distributed among the people, who, as they ate it, 
'showed signs of humiliation and sorrow, declaring it 
was the flesh of the deity.' How could the Roman 
Catholic fail to recognize the awful ceremony of the 
eucharist ? 

"With the same feelings they witnessed another cere- 
mony, that of the Aztec baptism, in which, after a solemn 
invocation, the head and lips of the infant were touched 
with water, and a name was given to it ; while the goddess 
Cioacoatl, who presided over childbirth, was implored 
'that the sin, which was given to us before the beginning 
of the world, might not visit the child, but that, cleansed 
by these waters, it might live and be born anew.' 

"It is true, these several rites were attended with 
many peculiarities, very unlike those in any Christian 
church. But the fathers fastened their eyes exclusively 
on the points of resemblance. They were not aware that 
the cross was the symbol of worship, of the highest 
antiquity, in Egypt and Syria ; and that rites, resembling 
those of communion and baptism, were practiced by 
pagan nations, on whom the light of Christianity had 
never shone. In their amazement, they not only mag- 
nified what they saw, but were perpetually cheated by the 
illusions of their own heated imaginations. In this they 
were admirably assisted by their Mexican converts, proud 
to establish — and half believing it themselves — a corre- 
spondence between their own faith and that of their 
conquerors." — Conquest of Mexico, Vol. III., pp. 383- 

387- 

The Latter-day Saints 1 have been as quick to see 
these analogies to the Jewish and Christian faiths as 

1 "Divinity of the Book of Mormon," pp. 49, 50, "Book of Mormon 
Verified," p. so. 



422 



CUM OR AH REJ'ISITED 



have the old Catholic missionaries, and they hold them 
up as conclusive proof that the Book of Mormon is true 
in its teachings on the religions of the ancient Americans. 
But., as Prescott says, they are not aware "that the cross 
was the symbol of worship, of the highest antiquity, in 
Egypt and Syria: and that rites, resembling those of 
communion and baptism, were practiced by pagan nations 
on whom the light of Christianity had never shone," and 
they magnify these resemblances, being "perpetually 
cheated by the illusions of their own heated imagina- 
tions." When the matter is carefully looked into, these 
rites lose much of their similarity to the Jewish and 
Christian. 

Let us first take up a number of cases in which the 
application of water ceremonially played an important 
part for the purpose of ascertaining whether they do or 
do not suggest the former practice of Christian baptism 
on this continent. 

On certain occasions the Tupi priests of Brazil assem- 
bled the people together, filled large jars with water, and, 
after repeating some magical words over them, sprinkled 
the congregation with palm branches. 1 The Maya priests 
sprinkled both their idols and the votaries with water 
which either had to be morning dew or that which flowed 
from a well of which no woman had ever tasted. 2 A 
Xatchez chief, when persuaded against his will not to 
offer himself on the pyre of his ruler, took water and 
washed his hands, as did Pilate of old, to signify that he 
would not bear the moral responsibility for not dying. 
The ancient Peruvians, after confessing their sins, bathed 
in the river, repeating the formula: "O thou River, re- 
ceive the sins I have this day confessed unto the Sun, 



1 "Myths." p. 147. 

2 "Myths," pp. 147, 148. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



423 



carry them down to the sea, and let them never more 
appear." The Navajo, who carries a dead body to its 
burial, holds himself unclean until he has washed himself 
in water specifically prepared by certain ceremonies. As 
the reader has noticed, repeated bathings were essential 
to a proper observance of the busk of the Creeks. In 
Peru the child was immersed by the priest in water which 
afterwards was buried in the ground. The Cherokees 
believe that the rite must be performed when the child is 
three days old, or else it will die, but the origin of this 
belief and practice is very doubtful. Among the Zapotecs 
the child, as soon as it was born, was immersed in a 
near-by river by its parents, who invoked the inhabitants 
of the water to extend their protection to it. In the mar- 
riage ceremony of the Nahuas the wedded pair had water 
poured over them by the officiating priest while they 
were seated upon green reed mats. The Mayas believed 
that ablutions washed away sins, and children were bap- 
tized between the ages of three and twelve years, the 
parents fasting for three days before the ceremony. And 
among the Cherokees ceremonial purification by water 
was essential as a preliminary to every undertaking. It 
preceded their game of ball, their green-corn dance, their 
search for a wife, etc. 1 

Of the so-called ordinance of baptism among the 
Aztecs, Briart writes : "Usually, the midwife washed the 
new-born, and said to him : 'Receive this water, for thy 
mother is the goddess Chalchiutlicue. This bath wipes 
out the stains that come from thy fathers, cleanses thy 
heart, and gives thee a new life.' Then, addressing her- 
self to the goddess, she asked her to grant her prayer. 
Next, taking the water in her right hand, and breathing 



1 "Myths," pp. 150, 151. 



424 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



on it, she moistened the mouth, the head and the breast 
of the child with it, and bathed him, saying: 'May the 
invisible god descend upon this water, may he wipe out 
all thy sins, may he guard thee against evil fortune! 
Gracious creature, the gods Ometeuctli and Omecihuatl 
have created thee in the highest heaven, to send thee to 
this earth; but know thou that life is sad, painful, and 
full of misery and evil, and that thou canst eat only by 
working. May God help thee in the many troubles that 
await thee!' After this discourse she congratulated the 
father, the mother and the relatives. The bath over, they 
consulted the soothsayers in regard to the good or bad 
fortune in store for the child. The sign that marked the 
day of his birth was noted, and also the one that ruled 
during the period of the last thirteen years. If the child 
was born at midnight, they compared the preceding day 
and the day following. These observations completed, 
the soothsayers foretold the future lot of the new-born. 
If the day was considered ill-omened, the second bath of 
the child was postponed for five days. The second bath 
was more important than the first; the relatives, the 
friends and a number of children were invited to be 
present. If the father was rich, he gave a banquet and pre- 
sented a garment to each guest. If he was a soldier, he 
made a little dress, a miniature bow and four little arrows 
for the new-born ; if a laborer or artisan, some little tools 
like those used in his own trade. The same was done in 
the case of girls, for whom little spindles were made. A 
number of lights were ignited, and the midwife carried 
the child about the court of the dwelling, placed it on a 
heap of leaves, near a basin, and repeated the words 
already quoted. Rubbing all his limbs, she added : 'Where 
art thou, evil fortune? Leave the body of this child.' 
She then raised him above her head, offered him to the 



CUMORAH REVISITED 425 

gods, and prayed them to grant him all the virtues. She 
then invoked the goddess of the waters, next the sun and 
the earth. 'Thou, O Sun, father of all living,' she said, 
'and thou, O Earth, our mother, accept this child, protect 
it as though it were thine own son! If he must be a 
soldier, may he die in battle, defending the honor of the 
gods, so that he may be able to enjoy in heaven the pleas- 
ures reserved for the brave who sacrifice in such a good 
cause.'" — The Aztecs, pp. 196-198. Following these 
ceremonies the child was given a name, and, if a boy, the 
tiny implements of warfare were buried in a field where 
it was supposed he might in the future fight; while, if a 
girl, the spindle was buried in the dwelling underneath 
the stone for pounding maize. 

The Maya rite, which was quite similar, was called 
zihil, which signifies "to be born again." It was con- 
sidered essential to a pure life and a protection against 
misfortune and evil spirits. It was administered to chil- 
dren of both sexes at any time between the ages of three 
and twelve years. The parents desiring their children 
baptized notified the priest, who published notices 
throughout the town of the day upon which the ceremony 
was to be performed. This done, the fathers selected five 
of the most influential men of the community to act as 
assistants, and for three days before fasted and refrained 
from sexual intercourse. When the time arrived the 
guests gathered in the home of one of the parents where 
the ceremony was to be performed. In the courtyard 
fresh leaves were strewn, upon which the boys were 
arranged in a row in charge of godfathers and the girls 
in charge of godmothers. After the purification of the 
house, with the object of casting out the demons, which 
was done by the children throwing, one by one, a handful 
of cornmeal and incense upon a brazier, the priest, 



426 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



clothed in the robes of his office, proceeded to perform 
the ceremony. This consisted in blessing the children 
and purifying them with hyssop, at the same time offer- 
ing up prayers in their behalf, following which one of the 
five assistants, dipping a bone in water, moistened their 
foreheads, their features, their fingers and their toes, 
after which the priest cut from their hair a certain bead 
which had been attached in childhood, gave them flowers 
to smell and performed other simple rites. A grand ban- 
quet, called emku, "the descent of god," was then held, 
which was followed by a strict fast for the nine succeed- 
ing days. 1 

It requires a wide stretch of the imagination to see 
in any of these native ceremonies a suggestion of the 
former practice of Christian baptism on this continent. 
Christian baptism consists in a simple immersion of a be- 
liever in water in the name of the Father and of the Son 
and of the Holy Spirit, and to this all Latter-day Saints 
without exception agree. But, in some of these cere- 
monies, water was applied by sprinkling and pouring; in 
others the rite was performed at intervals, sometimes 
repeatedly ; in others the candidate, if such he may be 
called, baptized himself ; and in still others it was per- 
formed in honor of heathen gods and goddesses and was 
connected with superstitions of the grossest kind. I am 
willing to let the reader decide for himself whether or 
not the practice of applying water to the person cere- 
monially by the American Indians is suggestive of the 
rite of Christian baptism. 

As strong objections may be made to the claim that 
certain rites found in America were but the ordinance 
of Christian communion in a perverted form. In Nica- 



1 Bancroft, II: 684. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



427 



ragua, during certain observances, the worshipers "sprin- 
kled maize with the blood from their privy parts, and it 
was distributed and eaten as blessed bread." — Native 
Races, Vol. II. , p. 710. At the feast celebrated in honor 
of their first captain, Vichilopuchitl, the Mexicans "made 
a cake of the meal of bledos, which is called tzoali, and, 
having made it, they spoke over it in their manner, and 
broke it into pieces. These the high priest put into cer- 
tain very clean vessels, and with a thorn of maguey, 
which resembles a thick needle, he took up with the 
utmost reverence single morsels, and put them into the 
mouth of each individual, in the manner of a com- 
munion." — Ibid, Vol. III., p. 323. Among this same 
people, at the feast of their god of banquets and guests, 
Ome Acatl, a similar rite was performed. Dough was 
taken and kneaded by the principal men into the form of 
a bone, called the bone of Ome Acatl. After spending 
the night in gluttony and drunkenness, this bone was 
divided, at the break of day, and each one ate that which 
fell to his lot. Again, among the same people at the feast 
of Huitzilopochtli a dough image of this god was broken 
up and distributed among the men. This celebration was 
called teoqualo, meaning "the god is eaten." And in 
Peru at the feast of Raymi a cake made of the fine flour 
of maize by the Virgins of the Sun was eaten, and the 
fermented liquor of the country was drunken by the 
nobles at a banquet over which the Inca presided. 

These are the rites which the Spanish missionaries 
mistook for Christian communion, and are those which 
the Mormons refer to in order to prove that Christianity 
was once the religion of America. 



428 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



COSMOGONY. 

There are few tribes but who have some theory of 
the origin of things and of the appearance of man upon 
the earth. Brinton mentions two in the New World who 
have not, the Rootdiggers of California and the Eskimo. 
These seem content to suppose that things have always 
continued as they are, and will always so continue. But 
to most men, as reason has asserted itself, nature has 
suggested its beginning and also its end. 

At first, says the Greek, all was chaos, a shapeless 
mass. First appeared the spirit of love, Eros ; then the 
broad-chested earth, Gaea; then the darkness, Erebus, 
and the night, Nyx, from the union of which sprang the 
clear sky, Aether, and the day, Hemera. The earth of 
itself brought forth the firmament, Uranos, and the 
mountains and sea, Pontos, following which, from 
Uranos and Gaea, sprang the Titans, Giants and Cyclops. 
Out of these beginnings also sprang the gods of the 
Olympus, the heroes and the human race. 

According to Egyptian cosmogony, the universe is a 
gradually developing divinity, a quaternity, not a unity, 
composed of four members: Kneph, Spirit; Neith, mat- 
ter; Sevech, time, and Pascht, space. These were con- 
ceived of as independent and underived. Of the four, 
Sevech and Pascht were passive, while Kneph and 
Neith, who combined to produce the world, were active. 
Neith was thought to be a great ball around which 
Kneph brooded in preparing it for its transformation. 
The first product of the union was Ptah, the fire and 
light element; in the next stage the firmament, Pe, and 
the earth, Anuke, were produced; following which the 
sun, moon and stars were created and hung in the 
heavens. 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



429 



The cosmological myth of the Chinese describes the 
primal state as one of darkness and chaos. From an egg 
came a being called Poon-koo-wong. Out of the lower 
half of the shell of the egg he made the earth and out 
of the upper half the heavens. With his right hand he 
made the sun and with his left the moon and stars, fol- 
lowing which he created the five elements — earth, fire, 
water, metal and wood. He caused a vapor to rise from 
a piece of gold and also one from a piece of wood, 
which, breathing upon, he transformed, respectively, into 
a male and a female principle. From the union of these 
two principles sprang a son and a daughter, who were 
the beginning of the human race. 

The native Americans, too, had various myths ac- 
counting for the origin of things and the advent of man 
upon the earth. 

The cosmogony of the Aztecs and kindred tribes is 
as follows : "According to the Nahuatlacs, there existed, 
before the creation of the universe, a heaven, inhabited 
by Tonacatecuhtli and his wife Tonacacihuatl, who in 
time procreated four sons. The skin of the oldest, 
Tlatlauhquitezcatlipoca, was red; that of the second, 
Yayauhqui, black, and his instincts evil ; that of the 
third, Quetzalcoatl, was white ; while the youngest, Huit- 
zilipochtli, was a mere skeleton covered with a yellow 
skin. 

"After six hundred years of idleness the gods resolved 
to act. They named Quetzalcoatl and Huitzilipochtli as 
executors of their will ; these thereupon created fire, and 
then a demi-sun. They afterwards created a man, Oxo- 
moco, and a woman, Cipactonatl, whom they commanded 
to cultivate the ground with care. Cipactonatl, who was 
also required to spin and weave, was endowed with the 
gift of prophecy. As a reward for her oracles she was 



430 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



given grains of maize to serve as food for her descend- 
ants. The gods then made Mictlanteuchtli and his com- 
panion, Mictlancihuatl, whom they appointed rulers of 
the infernal regions. This done, they divided time into 
days, months and years. 

"Resuming their work, they created a first heaven, 
inhabited by two stars, one male, the other female ; then 
a second, which they peopled with Tetzahuacihuatl 
('women skeletons'), intended to devour human beings 
when the end of the world came. In the third heaven 
they placed four hundred men, yellow, black, white, blue 
and red. The fourth heaven served as a residence for 
birds, which thence descended to the earth; in the fifth, 
which was peopled with fiery serpents, comets and fall- 
ing stars had their origin. The sixth was the empire of 
the wind, the seventh that of dust, and the eighth the 
abode of the gods. It was not known what existed be- 
tween this one and the thirteenth, the rtsidence of the 
immutable Tonacatecuhtli. 

"In this creation, water received a special organiza- 
tion ; for the gods met to form Tlalocaltecuhtli and his 
wife, Chalchiutlicue, who became masters of the liquid 
element. In the dwelling inhabited by these two were 
four pools filled with different waters. The water of the 
first pool helped germination, that of the second withered 
the seed, the water of the third froze them, and that of 
the fourth dried them. Tlaloc, in his turn, created a 
multitude of small ministers charged with the execution 
of his orders. Furnished with an amphora and armed 
with a wand, these pygmies carried the water where the 
god directed them, and sprinkled it as rain. Thunder 
was produced whenever one of them broke his jar, and 
the lightning which struck men was nothing but a frag- 
ment of the shattered vessel. In the midst of the waters 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



43i 



a great fish, called Cipactli, charged with sustaining and 
directing the earth, had been created. 

"The first woman bore a son ; as he had no com- 
panion, the gods made him one out of a hair. The demi- 
sun illuminated the world imperfectly, hence Tezcatli- 
poca undertook the task of fashioning a complete star. 
The Nahuatlacs believe that the sun and moon wandered 
in space. The sun — a curious detail — traversed half the 
space open before him, and then retreated. His image 
in the west was only his reflection. Lastly, the four gods 
created the giants, and then Huitzilipochtli's bones took 
on a covering of flesh. 

"Discord broke out among the creators. Quetzalcoatl, 
with a blow of his stick, precipitated Tezcatlipoca into 
the water, where he was transformed into a tiger, and 
took his brother's place as the sun. After a period of 
more than six hundred years, the great tiger Tezcatlipoca 
gave Quetzalcoatl a blow with his paw, and precipitated 
him in turn from the heavens. The fall of the god pro- 
duced such a wind that almost all mankind perished ; 
those who survived were transformed into monkeys. 

"The quarrels of the gods took long to subside. 
Tezcatlipoca rained fire over the earth, Chalchiutlicue 
flooded it, and then it was necessary to re-people it. 
Whereupon Camaxtle-Huitzilipochtli, striking a rock 
with his stick, caused the Chichimec-Otomites, who had 
peopled the earth before the Aztecs, to come forth." — ■ 
The Aztecs, pp. 104, 105. 

Of the cosmogony of the Mayas we know but little. 
It is known, however, that, like the Nahuas, they divided 
the period of the existence of the universe into epochs, 
at the close of each of which there occurred a general 
destruction of both gods and men. Aguilar, an early 
writer, claims that the native books recorded three such 



432 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



periodical cataclysms, the first being called mayacimil, 
''general death;" the second, oc na kuchil, "the ravens 
enter the houses," which signifies that the inhabitants 
were all dead, and the third, hurt ye cil, a universal del- 
uge, during which the surface of the water was within 
the distance of one stalk of maguey from the sky. Ac- 
cording to this account the present is the fourth age of 
the world instead of the fifth, as the Nahuas believe. 
Their "terrestrial Paradise," where men were created, 
was called hun anhil, and the first man was anum, from 
the verb anhel, to stand erect. 1 

The Quiches have left us the richest mythological 
legacy of all of the American tribes. According to their 
account, nothing existed in the beginning but a broad 
expanse of sea. The first creation was that of the earth, 
with the mountains and trees upon it, which was spoken 
into existence by Gucumatz, the Creator, Former, Domi- 
nator and Feathered Serpent. The next step was that of 
bringing into being the various forms of animal life, but, 
as the beasts could not speak, a curse was pronounced 
upon them and it was decreed that their flesh should be 
humiliated and that they should be killed and eaten. The 
gods, then, took counsel relative to the making of man. 
The first man was made of clay, but as he was without 
cohesion, consistence, motion or strength, he was con- 
sumed in the water. Next they made a man of wood and 
a woman out of a certain kind of pith, but these also were 
unsatisfactory, for while they moved about and peopled 
the earth with a race of wooden manikins like them- 
selves, they were without heart and intelligence and 
could not worship their creators, so the gods sent death 
and destruction upon them and they were all destroyed 



1 "Mayan Primer," p. 46. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



433 



excepting a few who now exist in the woods in the form 
of apes. Once more the gods counseled together and 
made four perfect men of yellow and white maize. With 
these they were highly pleased, and as they slept they 
made four women for them, who became their wives and 
from whom the divisions of the Quiche race sprang. It 
appears that subsequently other men were created from 
whom came the other tribes. 1 

At first all was water, say the Athapascas, when the 
raven with eyes of fire, glances of lightning and the clap- 
ping of whose wings was thunder, descended upon this 
primal ocean, from which the land instantly arose and 
remained on the surface. By him all the varieties of 
animals were created and from him all the tribes of this 
stock trace their descent. 2 

According to the picture writing of the Miztecs, be- 
fore time all things were orderless and water covered 
the slime and ooze that then composed the earth. 
Through the efforts of two winds, Nine Serpents, per- 
sonified as a bird, and Nine Caverns, personified as a 
winged serpent, the waters subsided and the land ap- 
peared. 3 

The Guaymis, of Costa Rica, relate that before all 
things was Noncomala, who formed the world and the 
waters, but they were in darkness and clouds. So, cohab- 
iting with the water sprite, Rutbe, he produced two male 
twins, who, after thriving with their mother for twelve 
years, left her to become the sun and moon, the twin 
lights of the world.* 

The Iroquois claim that their female ancestor, being 

1 Bancroft, 111:42-54. 

2 "Myths," p. 267. 

3 "Myths," p. 230. 
* "Myths," p. 231. 



434 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



kicked from the sky by her angry husband, fell to an 
island in the great sea which was constructed for her by 
the beaver, otter and muskrat. 1 

The tribes of Los Angeles County, California, have 
an account that their god, Quaoar, coming down from 
heaven, reduced the primal chaos to order and put the 
world on the back of seven giants, following which 
he created the lower animals, and, lastly, a man and a 
woman. 2 

According to the Koniagas there resided in heaven a 
great deity, Shi jam Schoa, who created two beings and 
sent them down to the earth, the raven accompanying 
them as light-bearer. Here this original pair set things 
in order by making the sea, rivers, mountains and for- 
ests. 3 

The Kiowa claim that their ancestors came from a 
hollow Cottonwood log at the bidding of a supernatural 
progenitor. They came out one at a time until it came 
the turn of a pregnant woman, who stuck fast in the 
hole and thus blocked the way for the rest, which ac- 
counts for the numerical smallness of that tribe. Their 
supernatural progenitor also gave them the sun, divided 
the day and night, exterminated a number of vicious 
monsters, rendered the ferocious animals harmless and 
taught them the simple art of hunting. When this was 
done he took his place among the stars. 4 

The Cherokee cosmogonic myth bears the marks of 
native origin. According to it there was a time when 
there was nothing below the heavens but water. The 
animals were all above, in Galunlati, which was very 

1 "Myths," p. 231. 

2 Bancroft, III: 84. 

3 Bancroft, III : 104. 

4 "Seventeenth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," pr> .52, 153. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



435 



much crowded. They wondered what was below the 
water, and so the little water-beetle volunteered to go and 
see if he could find out. It darted hither and thither 
over the water, and, finding no firm place to rest, dived 
down to the bottom and brought up some soft mud, 
which began to grow and soon became an immense 
island. This island was afterwards fastened to the vault 
of the sky by four cords, from each of its four corners. 
At first the land was very wet and no animal could live 
on it, so they sent out the buzzard, which flew all over 
the earth, but found no resting-place. As he flew over 
what afterwards was the Cherokee country, he became 
very tired and his wings began to strike the ground. 
Wherever the ground was struck a valley was made, and 
wherever they turned up again a mountain was made, 
and this accounts for the mountainous condition of 
North Carolina and adjacent territory where the Chero- 
kees originally lived. When the land became dry the 
animals came down, but it was still dark, and so they got 
the sun and set it in its track to give light by day. 1 

In none of these accounts do we meet with any fea- 
tures specially suggestive of the account given in the 
first three chapters of Genesis. They are all very origi- 
nal, emanating from simple minds upon whom the light 
of divine revelation never shone. They betray the fact 
that their ancestors, like themselves, were enthralled in 
nature, and that their conceptions of the origin and end 
of things were formed under the influence of these sur- 
roundings. If the American Indian is a descendant of 
the Jew, and if the Christian religion was once — only 
about seventeen hundred years ago — the universal relig- 
ion of America, how is this utter absence of Jewish 



1 "Nineteenth Rept. Bu. Am, Ethno.," p. 239. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



cosmogonic features in the mythology of the American 
race to be accounted for? 

MYTHOLOGY. 

It is asserted that there is a striking similarity be- 
tween some of the American myths and the historical 
accounts of the children of Israel. Among the Ojibwas 
is found a tradition which resembles, somewhat closely, 
the account of Joseph and his brethren. The Tusayan 
have a tradition of their migrations according to which 
they were guided by a pillar of fire like Israel of old. 
The Pai Utes had a wilderness journey during which 
they were given drink from a magic cup, which never 
became empty, and were miraculously fed. And among 
the Tusayan, again, their culture hero passed dry shod 
through lakes and rivers whose waters were divided by 
a staff thrown into them. 1 

These, and similar myths which present some of the 
aspects of the Jewish historical accounts, are referred to 
as proving that the American Indians are descendants of 
Israel. Apostle P. P. Pratt says : "The Indians of Amer- 
ica are of Israel, as some of their manners, customs and 
traditions indicate." — A Voice of Warning, p. 79. 

The slight similarities mentioned are sufficient to 
cause comment, but are not sufficient to prove a relation- 
ship between the children of Israel and the American 
Indians. Says Dellenbaugh : "Certain resemblances be- 
tween the myths of the Amerinds and those of the Israel- 
ites increased the belief that the American race is the 
lost tribes. The Mormons specially hold to this opinion. 
But there is positively no ground for the belief." — North 
Americans of Yesterday, p. 403. 



1 "North Americans of Yesterday," pp. 403-405. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



437 



As well might it be assumed that the American race 
is an offshoot from the Ethiopian, for the folklore of our 
Southern negro presents a number of striking resem- 
blances to the myths and traditions of the American 
Indians. "There is also a strong resemblance," says Del- 
lenbaugh, "between many of the Amerind myths and 
stories and those of the negro, as any one may see 
who will compare them with Harris's delightful Uncle 
Remus." — North Americans of Yesterday, p. 405. Shall 
we decide from this that the American Indians are of 
African descent? 

Ignatius Donnelly, who experiences little difficulty in 
finding analogies, also traces a number of parallels be- 
tween the folklore of the Indians and that of the Greeks, 
Germans and Irish. 2 Some of the resemblances amount 
almost to identities. But these mythological analogies 
are comparatively too few and are traceable in too many 
directions to prove anything. They must be considered 
as mere coincidences. 

It is claimed, in support of the Book of Mormon, that 
certain American tribes had traditions according to 
which their ancestors were once in possession of a sacred 
book which after generations was hid in the earth. The 
following extract from Boudinot is often quoted: 
"There is a tradition related by an aged Indian of the 
Stockbridge tribe, that their fathers were once in posses- 
sion of a 'Sacred Book' which was handed down from 
generation to generation, and at last hid in the earth, 
since which time they have been under the feet of their 
enemies." — A Voice of Warning, p. 82. 

Boudinot's work appeared in 18 16, fourteen years be- 
fore the Book of Mormon came out, and I am satisfied 



"Atlantis," pp. 150-160. 



438 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



that it was this story that suggested the idea of buried 
records to the perpetrators of the Mormon fraud. I 
have not been able to find that this story has ever been 
substantiated; its value to us, therefore, is small. But 
there is another version of it as given by Josiah Priest: 
k 'Dr. West, of Stockbridge (Mass.), relates that an 
old Indian informed him that his fathers in this coun- 
try had not long since been in the possession of a book 
which they had for a long time carried with them; but, 
having lost the knowledge of reading it, they buried it 
with an Indian chief.'' — Book of Mormon Lectures, 
p. 265. 

If our Mormon friends will kindly tell us the name 
of the Indian chief with whom the Nephites buried their 
plates, we may be able to place more credence in their 
application of this story to the depositing of the Book of 
Mormon in Hill Cumorah. 

ESCHATOLOGY. 

Most all of the Indian tribes had some conception of 
a future life. Brinton mentions only one, the Lower 
Pend d'Oreilles, among whom such a belief was entirely 
wanting. The New England tribes called the soul 
chemung, the Quiche natub, the Eskimo tamak, the Da- 
kota nagi and the Pottawatamie gepam, which words 
simply mean the shadow. In the Mohawk the word for 
soul, atonritz, is from atonrion, to breathe. The mis- 
sionaries to an Oregon tribe, in translating the Bible into 
their language, finding no word for soul, were forced to 
translate it by a word meaning "the lower gut." The 
Iroquois and Algonkin believed that man had two souls, 
one of a vegetative character, the other ethereal. The 
Dakotas increased the number, with Plato, to three, one 
of which went to a warm country, another to a cold, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



439 



while the third stands guard over the body. Certain 
Oregon tribes placed a soul in every member of the 
human body. 1 

The Book of Mormon teaches that men will be re- 
warded or punished according to the degree of good and 
evil done in this life. This was the belief of the Ne- 
phites. It teaches the doctrines of a heaven of eternal bliss 
where souls purified from all sin and saved by the blood 
of the Son of God will live forever, and a hell of eternal 
punishments. "I would desire that ye should consider 
on the blessed and happy state of those that keep the 
commandments of God. For behold, they are blessed in 
all things, both temporal and spiritual ; and if they hold 
out faithful to the end, they are received into heaven, 
that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never- 
ending happiness." — Mosiah i : 12. "And now, I have 
spoken the words which the Lord God hath commanded 
me. And thus saith the Lord: They shall stand as a 
bright testimony against this people, at the judgment 
day ; whereof, they shall be judged, every man, accord- 
ing to his works, whether they be good, or - nether they 
be evil; and if they be evil, they are consigned to an 
awful view of their own guilt and abominations, which 
doth cause them to shrink from the presence of the Lord, 
into a state of misery and endless torment, from whence 
they can no more return." — Mosiah 1 : 16. 

But no such theories of the after-life appear in the 
religions of the Americans. The world to come was 
usually a counterpart of this, or, if they believed in any 
rewards and punishments at all, the good rewarded was 
not a moral good nor the evil punished a moral evil. 
"Nowhere," says Brinton, "was any well-defined doctrine 



1 "Myths," Chapter IX. 



440 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



that moral turpitude was judged and punished in the 
next world. Xo contrast is discoverable between a place 
of torments and a realm of joy ; at the worst, but a nega- 
tive castigation awaited the liar, the coward, or the nig- 
gard." — Myths, p. 283. 

The soul of the Indian was not thought to go to hell 
for murder, theft, lying or rapine, nor to heaven for 
virtue or honesty ; but, if there were any higher places 
for it in the next world, they were reached by the num- 
ber of scalps taken, the number of ponies stolen or by 
the attention paid to certain rude, primitive ceremonies. 
Parkman says : "The primitive Indian believed in the 
immortality of the soul, but he did not always believe in 
a state of future reward and punishment. Nor, when 
such a belief existed, was the good to be rewarded a 
moral good, or the evil to be punished a moral evil. 
Skillful hunters, brave warriors, men of influence and 
consideration, went, after death, to the happy hunting- 
ground; while the slothful, the cowardly and the weak 
were doomed to eat serpents and ashes in dreary regions 
of mist and darkness. In the general belief, however, 
there was but one land of shades for all alike." — The 
Jesuits, p. 80. 

A belief in a heaven and a hell where moral good is 
rewarded and moral evil is punished was not even to be 
found among the more civilized nations. Says Brinton ; 
"If the conception of a place of moral retribution was 
known at all to the race, it should be found easily recog- 
nizable in Mexico, Yucatan or Peru. But the so-called 
'hells' of their religions have no such significance, and 
the spirits of evil, who were identified by early writers 
with Satan, no more deserve the name than does the 
Greek Pluto." — Myths, p. 291. 

With the Aztecs the souls of men went to three 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



441 



places. The soul of the warrior slain in battle, of the 
prisoner sacrificed by the enemy and of the woman dying 
in childbirth, went to the dwelling of the sun. The souls 
of those killed by lightning, or who were drowned, or 
who died of such diseases as dropsy, tumor or leprosy, 
as well as the children sacrificed to Tlaloc, went to a cool, 
agreeable place called Tlalocan ; while the rest, good, bad 
and indifferent, went to a "hell" called Mictlan, the only 
disagreeable feature of which was darkness. 1 

The Mayas believed in a place of everlasting delight 
and voluptuous repose, where the good recline beneath 
the shade of the Yaxche, eating dainty food and drink- 
ing delicious drinks. This place of delight was especially 
open to those who committed suicide by hanging, as the 
goddess Ix Tabai carried them thither herself. The 
wicked, Bancroft says, went to Mitnal, but Brinton de- 
clares that this was only the universal state to which all 
must "come at last." 2 

A certain unwarlike tribe of Guatemala believed that 
only those who died a natural death were accorded a 
future life; the bodies of the slain were, therefore, left 
to the beasts and vultures. 3 

With the Quiches all the dead went to Xibalba, "the 
place of disappearance," supposed to be under the 
ground. 4 

The Tlascaltecs thought that the souls of people of 
prominence enter, at death, into the bodies of the higher 
animals and into gems and clouds, while the souls of less 
rank pass into the forms of the lower animals. 5 

The Nicaraguans claimed that the souls of slain war- 

1 Bancroft, III : 532. 

2 "Mayan Primer," p. 44. 

3 Bancroft, 111:542. 

4 "Myths," p. 292. 

5 Bancroft, III: 539. 



442 



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riors enter the sunrise regions, where all the good go, 
but the evil, those who do not reverence the gods, are 
doomed to annihilation in the abode of Miquetanteot. 1 

Among the Mosquitos the belief prevailed that heaven 
is open to all, because of which at birth they tied a bag of 
seeds around the neck of the infant to pay his ferriage 
across the river of death beyond which lies paradise. 2 

When the Hidatsa dies, according to Dr. Matthews, 
his soul lingers for four nights around the camp or vil- 
lage, when it departs to the village of the dead. Here, if 
it has been brave, self-denying and ambitious on earth, 
it is held in honor ; if not, it is despised. 3 

According to the Chippewa belief the soul of the dead 
man goes to a region to the south situated by the great 
ocean. Before reaching it, however, a river has to be 
crossed, the only bridge over which is a large snake. 
Those who die by drowning never reach the other side, 
but are thrown into the river and remain there forever. 
Others, who die in a lethargy or a trance, coming to the 
stream, are prevented from crossing by serpents, and 
return to reanimate their bodies. Those who get over 
spend their time in various ways. Those who have been 
good spend it in singing and dancing and feeding upon 
mushrooms, which are there very abundant. The souls 
of the bad are simply haunted by phantoms. If a man 
has been wronged, his soul may haunt his persecutor. 4 

None of these beliefs suggest to an unbiased mind 
the eschato logical theories advanced in the Book of Mor- 
mon. In the main the tribes made no distinction between 
the states of the good and the bad in the world to come, 

1 Bancroft, III: 543. 

2 Bancroft, III: 543. 

3 "First Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 199. 

4 "First Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 199. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



443 



and where they did these terms did not convey to their 
minds the same senses that they convey to ours. If they 
had a heaven at all, it was not reached by moral well- 
doing, but, as Brinton tells us, "by the manner of death, 
the punctuality with which certain sepulchral rites were 
fulfilled by relatives, or other similar arbitrary circum- 
stance beyond the power of the individual to control.' 1 1 
If the ancient Americans held to the beliefs stated in the 
Book of Mormon, how is their total absence among the 
American Indians to be accounted for ? 

THE CHARACTER OF THE ANCIENT AMERICAN RELIGIONS 
AS REVEALED IN THE REMAINS. 

In the foregoing pages of this chapter I have endeav- 
ored to show that the Mormon claim that the American 
Indians originally believed in a single Great Spirit, a 
Trinity, the crucifixion of Christ, a devil, a heaven and a 
hell, practiced baptism and celebrated the eucharist — evi- 
dences of the former existence of Christianity — meets 
with no confirmation in either the beliefs and ceremonies 
of existing tribes, their myths and traditions or their 
religious terms. Our present inquiry will be : Is the 
theory, that the ancient Americans were Jews and Chris- 
tians, suggested in the relics and remains? 

A large proportion of the antiquities of America are 
sacred antiquities. In North America we have the temple 
mounds which are known to have been used in some in- 
stances as bases for religious structures ; in Mexico, the 
crumbling temples of Teotihuacan, "The City of the 
Gods," and the pyramids of Cholula ; in Central America, 
the temples of Palenque and the idols and altars of 
Copan ; and in Peru, the mysterious edifices of Pacha- 



1 "Myths," p. 283. 



444 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



camac and Tiahuanaco. These antiquities all bear wit- 
ness that the ancient Americans were religious peoples 
who worshiped gods, believed in a hereafter, offered sac- 
rifices and performed various religious rites. 

In the Old World the archaeologist has little difficulty 
in arriving at a conclusion as to the general character of 
the ancient religions. The idols, the altars, the temples, 
the religious paintings and the hieroglyphical inscriptions 
of Egypt and Assyria leave him with no doubts as to the 
idolatrous character of the ancient religions of those 
countries. It requires but a passing glance for him to 
see that they did not partake of the distinctive features 
of Judaism and Christianity. But the evidences in Egypt 
and Assyria show no more conclusively that the old re- 
ligions were not Judaism and Christianity than do those 
of America. Here, too, the idols, the temples, the altars, 
the religious paintings and the hieroglyphical inscriptions 
all testify to the idolatrous character of the ancient wor- 
ship. There is not a figment of evidence to sustain the 
theory that the builders of Copan and Quirigua were 
monotheists, or that the builders of Chimu, in Peru, and 
Cholula and Teotihuacan, in Mexico, were Jews and 
Christians. I shall now put before the reader a number 
of reasons based upon the archaeology of the country, for 
believing that the ancient Americans were all pagans and 
idolaters. 

i. We infer the heathen character of the ancient relig- 
ions of America from the utter absence on this continent 
of both Jewish and Christian antiquities. 

Although the Book of Mormon declares that as soon 
as the Nephites had become fully settled in Peru they 
built a temple "like unto Solomon's," and that afterwards 
they erected "temples," "sanctuaries" and "synagogues," 
"after the manner of the Jews," the Mormon archaeolo- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



445 



gist has never been able to point out the remains of a 
single Jewish religious edifice on the continent. Neither 
has he been able to point out a single religious structure 
that bears evidence of ever having been used in Christian 
worship. The temples of America were no more like the 
religious edifices of the Jews and Christians than a light- 
house is like the Mosque of Omar. They were built upon 
a different plan and were adapted to entirely different 
modes of worship. The temples of Peru we know were 
used chiefly for the worship of the sun and moon, while 
many of those of the Mississippi Valley were constructed 
for the same purpose. The Book of Mormon claim that 
the Nephites in the latter section of the continent built 
"temples," "synagogues" and "sanctuaries" of wood and 
cement is positively refuted both by the absence of such 
structures and the fact that the Mound Builders used 
neither cement nor mortar. In Mexico there are as few 
grounds for this claim as in the Mississippi Valley. No 
archaeologist that I have ever heard of, whose writings 
are considered authoritative, mentions the finding of a 
single Jewish or Christian temple, altar, painting or 
inscription. With one accord they all declare that the 
ancient inhabitants of those countries were pagans and 
idolaters. It will not do to claim that the ravages of time 
and of the warlike Lamanites have completely obliterated 
every trace of these structures, for, considering the wide- 
spread extent of these faiths and the length of time in 
which they were held, this would be next to impossible. 
Egypt and Assyria, too, have had their wars, and time 
and the elements have affected their ruins, but, neverthe- 
less, enough data remain for the archaeologist to deter- 
mine without difficulty the character of their worship, the 
names of their gods and many of their religious cere- 
monies and beliefs. If the ancient Americans were Jews 



446 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



and Christians, will the Mormon Church kindly tell us 
where the archaeological proof of it is to be found? 

2. We infer the heathen character of the ancient 
American religions from the similarity in plan of the 
ancient places of worship to those of historic tribes. 

No matter where you may go, the ancient structures 
were built after the pattern of the modern. This is true 
in Peru, Central America, Mexico and the Mississippi 
Valley. 

It will hardly be denied that, when the Europeans 
first met the American tribes, the latter were all idolaters 
and pagans. In Peru, Central America and Mexico, 
as well as in the Mississippi Valley and in the less 
civilized parts of the continent, the early settlers found 
the natives worshiping animals, the elements, deified 
heroes and idols, offering human, animal and vegetable 
sacrifices and practicing heathen rites. All of these tribes 
and nations had places of worship varying in splendor 
and stability from the bark-covered hut of the North 
American medicine man to the large and elaborately 
decorated structures of Mexico and Peru. 

Among the Natchez, and certain other tribes of the 
Mississippi Valley, the temples were built upon the sum- 
mits of truncated pyramids, and in them perpetual fires 
were kept burning in honor of the sun. "The confirm- 
atory testimony of early explorers," says Nadaillac, 
"shows that the valley of the Mississippi, as well as the 
districts now forming the States of Ohio, Florida and 
Georgia, was inhabited by warlike nations, who tilled the 
ground, lived in fortified towns, erected their temples on 
eminences, often artificial, and worshiped the sun. These 
were the men who repulsed Narvaez when he endeavored 
to conquer Florida in 1528." — Prehistoric America, p. 
189. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



447 



The temples of Mexico and Central America were 
also built upon the summits of high and artificial emi- 
nences. The great temple of Mexico, which was erected 
only a few years before the Discovery, was built upon a 
high mound, which, with the court at its base, covered 
the large square now occupied by the great cathedral. 
The court was paved with stones which were so smooth 
than the Spanish cavalry hardly dared to venture upon 
them, and was surrounded by a wall made of dressed 
and sculptured stone and mortar, 4,800 feet in circum- 
ference, nine feet high and built facing the four cardinal 
points. It was also pierced by four gates. From the 
center of the court rose the great pyramid, 375 feet long 
by 300 broad at the base and 325 by 250 at the summit 
and 86 feet high. The mound rose in five superimposed, 
perpendicular terraces, was composed of earth, stones 
and clay, and was covered with square pieces of stone 
of equal size, fitted together with cement and coated with 
lime or gypsum. At the northwest corner the ledges 
were graded to form a series of 114 steps, each about 
nine inches high, leading from terrace to terrace, and so 
arranged that the edifice had to be completely encircled 
to reach the summit. The steps were of stone, and the 
platform on the top of the mound was of the same 
material and polished like the court below. On the sum- 
mit, at the east end of the platform, stood two towers, 
each with three stories and each fifty-six feet in height. 
The lower story of each was made of masonry, the two 
upper of wood, with wooden cupolas, well painted, 
adorning their roofs. The sanctuaries were in the lower 
stories, one being dedicated to Huitzilopochtli, the other 
to Tezcatlipoca. The images of these gods stood upon 
stone altars, three or four feet high, and were covered 
with rich curtains hung with tassels and pellets of gold, 



448 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Before these altars stood the terrible stone of sacrifice, 
a green block five feet long by three wide and three high, 
bulging in the middle so as to make the extraction of 
the heart easy. The walls and ceilings were painted with 
monstrous figures and ornamented with stucco and 
carved woodwork. In i486, at the dedication of this 
temple, 72,344 captives were sacrificed, and ever after- 
wards, up to the overthrow of the Aztec people, its altars 
were hardly ever dry from the blood of man. 1 

The temples of the Mayas, at the time of the Con- 
quest, resembled those of Mexico, in being built upon 
high eminences which were made of, or faced with, 
stone. In speaking of the Spaniards, Bancroft says: 
"They found the immense stone pyramids and buildings 
of most of the cities still used by the natives for religious 
services., although not for dwellings, as they had prob- 
ably never been so used even by their builders." — Native 
Races, Vol. IV., p. 281. This was true of the religious 
structures of Uxmal, Tuloom, Chichen Itza and Peten, 
which are comparatively modern cities. 

The reader has now set before him the chief features 
of the religious architecture of historic tribes, and is 
prepared to discern the similarity between it and the 
religious architecture of the ancient inhabitants. 

Everything goes to prove that the "veritable Mound 
Builders," like the Natchez, built their temples of perish- 
able materials upon artificial eminences. The so-called 
temple mounds are found scattered throughout the Mis- 
sissippi and Ohio Valleys. Chief among them are those at 
Marietta, Ohio; Cahokia, Illinois, and Seltzertown, Mis- 
sissippi. As these mounds are identical in size and shape 
with those found in process of erection, or used, by his- 



1 Bancroft, II: 577. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



449 



toric tribes when the Spanish and French settlers first 
came into the country, we can not escape the conclusion 
that the Mound Builders, like the Natchez and other his- 
toric tribes, employed them as bases for their temples of 
the sun. And this is the opinion of our archaeologists. Says 
Foster: "The Mound-builders worshiped the elements — 
the sun, the moon, and particularly fire. They erected 
their fire-altars for sacrifice on the highest summits." — 
Prehistoric Races, p. 182. Says MacLean: 'Tt is not 
improbable that the Mound Builders erected their great 
temple mounds to the worship of the sun, moon and 
stars." — The Mound Builders, p. 126. And Peet declares 
that "some of the mound relics evidently present the 
tokens of a combined animal and sun worship, and some 
even of combined sun worship and idol worship." — 
Myths and Symbols, p. 126. 

Chief among the ancient temples of Mexico are those 
of Cholula and Teotihuacan. At both of these places the 
ruins have an antiquity reaching back beyond the begin- 
ning of the Aztec period. But the temples of both were 
built upon the general plan of the temples of the historic 
tribes, and, further, it is known that they were not built 
for the worship of Jehovah, but of heathen divinities. 
The great temple mound at Cholula is said to be 7,740 
feet square at the base, formerly rising to the height of 
two hundred feet, with a platform two hundred feet 
square on the summit. It was originally terraced like 
the pyramid of Mexico, but, instead of its sides being 
faced with stone, they were faced with sun-dried bricks. 
It was also built facing the four cardinal points. While 
it certainly dates back to the earliest period of Toltec 
history, and perhaps further, it was still used at the time 
of the Conquest and was the scene of a fierce conflict 
between the natives and the Conquistadores. Tradition 



450 



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says that it was erected in honor of the Nahua god of 
the air, Quetzalcoatl, and there seems to be no just 
reason for denying this explanation of its origin. At 
Teotihuacan we find two immense pyramids and the 
Camino de los Muertos, "Pathway of the Dead." The 
larger of these pyramids is known to have been built for 
the worship of the sun. It is about 2,800 feet in circum- 
ference at the base and 180 feet high, the level summit 
being about one hundred feet square. It was divided 
into four stories by three terraces, each between twenty 
and thirty feet wide. The remains of a zigzag stairway 
are still visible on the east side, though it is supposed 
that the real stairway was on the west side. The other 
temple, that of the moon, is about two thousand feet in 
circumference at the base and is of proportional height. 
It is wholly impossible that the temples of Cholula and 
Teotihuacan were built for Jewish or Christian worship, 
for they were not constructed "after the manner of the 
Jews," while their similarity to modern structures, with 
the traditions of their origin, prove that they were 
erected for the worship of heathen gods. 

In Central America the most ancient ruins, probably, 
are those of Palenque, Copan and Quirigua. At Pa- 
lenque the best-preserved ruins are those of the "Pal- 
ace," and of the temples of the "Three Tablets," of the 
"Bas-reliefs," of the "Cross" and of the "Sun." All of 
these structures, like those of Yucatan, were built upon 
the summits of truncated pyramids which were origi- 
nally faced with stone. This feature, with the similarity 
of the hieroglyphics to those of Yucatan, proves that the 
builders of Palenque were the ancestors of the Mayas. 
The structures of this city are lavishly decorated with 
bas-reliefs and sculpture work, yet it hardly needs to 
be said that none of the figures represent religious 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



45i 



scenes familiar to Jews and Christians. They are all of 
heathen character and show that the religion of the 
ancient differed but little, if any, from the religion of 
the modern inhabitants. At both Copan and Quirigua 
we meet with pyramids and hieroglyphics similar to those 
of Palenque and Yucatan. 

The fact that both the ancient and modern inhabit- 
ants of North America employed truncated, terraced and 
stone- faced pyramids as bases for their temples strongly 
implies that if their religions were not identical, they 
were certainly similar. 

3. We infer the heathen character of the ancient 
American religions from the presence of idols in the 
most ancient remains. 

On the idols from the mounds, Rev. S. D. Peet writes 
as follows : "The idols found in the mounds are very 
significant. These images remind us of those sometimes 
seen on the facades of the palaces in Central America. 
They also remind us of the worship of the god of war, 
of rain, of death, and the god of light, which prevailed 
in Mexico. These idols became scattered, some being 
found in Ohio and various parts of the Mississippi Val- 
ley; but the images found in the so-called 'dead houses' 
of the southern tribes indicate that their religious system 
was different from that of the Ohio tribes. The idols of 
the stone-grave people are of various sizes, from large 
stone images, two feet or more in height, to small clay 
figures not over three inches in length. They were made 
of sandstone, limestone, fluor spar and stalactite, as. well 
as of clay. Some have been discovered in caves, others 
on the summits of high mounds, a few in the depths of 
the mounds ; but a large majority have been picked up 
from the surface. One of these is represented in the 
cut. It was found in a cave in Knox County, Tennessee. 



452 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



It may have been fashioned from a large stalactite. It is 
twenty inches in length and weighs thirty-seven pounds. 
It shows a prominent nose, heavy eyebrows, full cheeks, 
broad square chin and retreating forehead; all of which 
are features of the Muscogees or Southern Indians. The 
mouth is formed by a projecting ring; a groove runs 
across the face, between the nose and mouth ; in this 
respect it resembles the sculptured figures found in Mex- 
ico and Central America. Another idol in a sitting posi- 
tion was found in Perry County, Tennessee. Gen. G. P. 
Thruston, the best authority on the antiquities of Ten- 
nessee, has described several stone idols and terra-cotta 
images found in the stone-grave settlements at Nash- 
ville. These show flattened forehead and vertical occi- 
put, characteristic of the crania of the stone-grave race. 
He says the features of the face were of a heavy Ethi- 
opian cast, similar to those of the dark image in the 
pottery idols shown in the plate. Traces of garments 
are sometimes found on images of clay. The hands of the 
clay figures were frequently found in the same position. 
Mr. Caleb Atwater mentions two idols, found in a tumulus 
near Nashville, Tennessee ; another, near Natchez, Mis- 
sissippi. Thomas Jefferson mentions two Indian busts, 
found on the Cumberland River. Du Pratz says the 
Natchez had a temple filled with idols, images of men 
and women of stone and baked clay. According to the 
'Brevis Narratio/ the Indians venerated, as an idol, the 
column which Ribault had erected, to which they offered 
the finest fruits, perfumed oils, bows and arrows, and 
decorated it with wreaths of flowers." — The Mound 
Builders, pp. 336-339- 

These idols are sufficient to prove that the Mound 
Builders were neither Jews nor Christians, but idolaters. 

The idols of Mexico and Central America are like- 



CUM OR All REVISITED 



453 



wise found among the most ancient ruins, indicating that 
the builders of the ancient cities were idolaters. At 
Panuco, Mexico, Vecelli found thirty small archaeologi- 
cal specimens, among them rudely shaped figures of 
females, cut mostly* from limestone, with peculiar head- 
dresses. At Tusapan, in the same country, fragments of 
stone images, made to represent human and animal 
forms, were discovered. At Mitla, in the State of 
Oajaca, a stone idol was found which represents a human 
figure seated and cross-armed, with a peculiar, tube- 
shaped ornament running horizontally along the side of 
the face. And in the States of Oajaca, Zachila and 
Cuilapa certain terra-cotta images were taken from the 
graves. As the historic tribes of these localities wor- 
shiped similar images, it seems conclusive that the an- 
cient inhabitants were idolaters. 

Copan is acknowledged by nearly all archaeologists 
to be one of the most ancient of the cities of America, 
which the Mormons also maintain by giving it a possible 
identification with the Jaredite capital, Moron. Yet its 
builders were idolaters, as is shown by the presence of 
at least fourteen immense stone idols among its ruins. 
Of eight whose dimensions are given, the smallest is 
nearly twelve feet high by three and a half wide and 
thick. In each a human face, generally with calm and 
pleasing countenance, adorns the center in front, having 
in some cases a beard and a mustache. The hands, in 
nearly every instance, rest back to back upon the breast, 
while above and around the head is "a complicated mass 
of the most elaborate ornamentation, which utterly defies 
verbal description." These idols bear every evidence of 
being as old as the other monuments, and the presence of 
altars directly in front of them proves beyond doubt that 
they were the objects of worship. 



454 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



At Quirigua, three or four hundred yards from the 
principal pyramid, a group of sculptured idols were 
found resembling somewhat closely those at Copan. The 
largest of the group is twenty-six feet high, and the 
smallest nine feet. On these idols Bancroft says: 'The 
idols scattered over the surface of the ground, instead of 
being located on the pyramids, may indicate here, as at 
Copan, that the elevations served as seats for spectators 
during the religious ceremonies, rather than as temples 
or altars on which sacrifice was made." — Native Races, 
Vol. IV., p. 114. 

But this form of stone images was not confined to 
Copan and Quirigua alone, but has also been observed in 
other localities into Which the Maya tribes spread. In 
1852 Colonel Mendez accidentally discovered near Lake 
Peten, on the southern borders of Yucatan, two ruins 
which consisted of traces of stone walls and monoliths 
sculptured in high relief and decorated with figures re- 
sembling those on the monoliths of Copan and Quirigua. 
In the same locality he found "a collection of sculptured 
blocks upon a round disk, on which are carved hiero- 
glyphics and figures of the sun and moon with a pros- 
trate human form before them." — Native Races, Vol. 
IV., p. 138. This goes to prove that the ancient inhab- 
itants of this locality were sun and moon worshipers. At 
Lorillard City Charnay found a stone image of enormous 
size, with its head adorned with a head-dress spread out 
in the form of a fan. 

Idols from the cities of Yucatan are rare, yet some 
have been found. The probabilities are that such as 
escaped the hands of the fanatical Spanish priests were 
buried by the natives to prevent their desecration. Ban- 
croft says : "The scarcity of idols among the Maya 
antiquities must be regarded as extraordinary. The 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



455 



double-headed animal and the statue of the old woman 
at Uxmal; the nude figure carved on a long, flat stone, 
and the small statue in two pieces at Nohpat; the idol 
at Zayi, reported as in use for a fountain ; the rude, un- 
sculptured monoliths of Sijoh ; the scattered and vaguely 
mentioned idols on the plains of Mayapan, and the fig- 
ures in terra cotta collected by Norman at Campeche, 
complete the list; and many of these may have been 
originally merely decorations for buildings. That the 
inhabitants of Yucatan were idolaters there is no pos- 
sible doubt, and in connection with the magnificent 
shrines and temples erected by them, stone representa- 
tives of their deities carved with all their aboriginal art 
and rivaling or excelling the grand obelisks of Copan, 
might naturally be sought for. But in view of the facts, 
it must be concluded that the Maya idols were small, and 
that such as escaped the fanatic iconoclasm of the Span- 
ish ecclesiastics were buried by the natives, as the only 
means of preventing their desecration." — Native Races, 
Vol. IV., p. 277. 

The idols from Peru are also few in number, most 
of them being small. The larger part, probably, being 
made of gold and silver, went to the melting-pots of the 
Spanish invaders. At Pachacamac, however, the Span- 
iards found a temple, well painted and decorated, in a 
small recess of which there stood a wooden idol of the 
Creator, at the feet of which they found numerous gold 
and silver ornaments, the gifts of the devotees. At Tia- 
huanaco, Cieca de Leon, who accompanied Pizarro, found 
two stone idols in human form, apparently made by 
skillful artificers. One of these, which was carried to 
La Paz in 1842, is said to have measured three and a 
half yards in length, and to have been clothed in long 
vestments different from those worn by the Incas at the 



456 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



time of the Conquest. In 1846 several others were dug 
do m the same vicinity, with some very large blocks of 
cut stone, which were used for millstones. 

The presence of idols in the antiquities of both North 
and South x\merica, with the utter absence of both Jew- 
ish and Christian remains, indicates very plainly that the 
ancient inhabitants were idolaters. 

4. The presence of altars among the antiquities of 
America, which bear marks of having been used for the 
offering of human sacrifices, is another strong proof of 
the heathen character of the ancient religions. 

In the Mississippi and Ohio Valleys archaeologists 
have found a class of mounds which they have called 
"altar mounds. " The peculiar feature about them, and 
that which gives them their name, is an altar of clay or 
stone found in the center and resting upon the original 
surface. Upon these altars are sometimes found charred 
human bones, from which it has been inferred that they 
were employed as the places where human sacrifices 
were offered to heathen divinities. Still others hold that 
they were used, as they certainly have been in historic 
times, for the burning of prisoners at the stake, which 
cruel practice was semi-religious in character. In either 
case their builders were heathenish and idolatrous. 

At Copan, directly in front of the statues or idols 
previously described, stand blocks of stone which were 
used for altars. These stones are six or seven feet 
square and four feet high and take a variety of forms. 
Their sides are also ornamented with sculpture work and 
hieroglyphics. One of these altars is made to represent 
the back of a tortoise ; another is carved to represent the 
head of death. On the upper surface of each there are 
a number of grooves which, says Bancroft, "are strongly 
suggestive of flowing blood and slaughtered victims." 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



At Quirigua similar altars have been Lund, however 
not in front of the idols, but buried at some distance 
from them in moss and earth. They are most all of 
oval form, with hieroglyphics covering their sides, while 
one of them is supported upon two colossal heads and is 
inclosed, with one of the idols, by a wall with steps. 

At Palenque, in the Temple of the Cross, and directly 
in front of the tablet of the cross, is an altar. While at 
Orizava, in Vera Cruz, has been found a sacrificial yoke, 
made of green jasper, identical in shape with the sacri- 
ficial yokes of the Aztecs. These yokes were put around 
the neck of the victim to hold the head while the heart 
was being extracted. 

Tradition declares that human sacrificing dates from 
a remote antiquity and that it was practiced, with an 
intermission or two, by the tribes of both the Mayan and 
Nahuan stocks down to the time of the Conquest. Of 
the human sacrifices among the Mayas Nadaillac says: 
"These sacrifices, which dated from a very remote antiq- 
uity, lasted until the Spanish Conquest." — Prehistoric 
America, p. 268. Among the Nahua tribes they dated 
from pre-Toltec times, but afterwards, under the regime 
of Quetzalcoatl, were done away with, and the practice 
was not resumed until a few centuries before the Dis- 
covery. Says Bancroft: "Most prominent among his 
peculiar reforms, and the one that is reported to have con- 
tributed most to his downfall, was his unvarying opposi- 
tion to human sacrifice. This sacrifice had prevailed 
from pre-Toltec times at Teotihuacan, and had been 
adopted more or less extensively in Culhuacan and Tol- 
lan." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 261. 

5. The identification of certain etchings, paintings 
and carvings of the old races, as representations or 
symbols of divinities worshiped by historic tribes, is 



458 



CUM OR All REVISITED 



another proof of the heathen character of the ancient 

religions. 

Carvings, images and places of worship of such 
divinities as Quetzalcoatl, or Kukulkan, Tlaloc and 
Itzamna, have been discovered in the ruins of Uxmal, 
Chichen Itza and Palenque. 

On this point we have the following from Rev. S. D. 
Peet: "M. Charnay has described the pyramid called 
El Castillo, in Chichen Itza, and thinks that the building 
on it was a shrine to Cuculkan or Quetzalcoatl, for this 
is the pyramid which has the serpents for balustrades, 
and the feathered serpent is the symbol of this 'Culture 
Hero.' He has ascribed the shrine which contains cross 
No. 2, at Palenque, to Tlaloc, for he recognizes the eye 
of Tlaloc in one of the figures on the facades and thinks 
the palm leaves and masks were also emblems. The 
shrines at Uxmal and Lorillard, especially the one with 
heavy cornice and massive pillars, he also ascribes to 
Cukulkan, as he recognizes the feather-headed serpent 
in the pillars. The stone lintel at Lorillard, which con- 
tains a seated figure, he ascribes to the same divinity. 
The statue represented as lying upon the back and hold- 
ing a vase in the hands, which was found by M. Le 
Plongeon at Chichen Itza, he ascribes to Tlaloc, inas- 
much as there are carved on the stone a sheet of water, 
aquatic plants and fish, all of which are the emblems of 
Tlaloc. Others, however, think it represents the Maya 
Bacchus, or god of wine. The doorpost on the Castillo 
at Chichen Itza, which has sculptured figures with head- 
dress, girdle, sash, sandal, wand and a bearded face, 
with the vine expressing speech extending from the 
mouth, Charnay thinks represents Quetzalcoatl, on ac- 
count of the beard. Another figure on the capital above 
the pillars has a turban with a feather head-dress and 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



459 



stands with upraised arms supporting the entablature. 
He wears large bracelets, a collar of precious stones, a 
shield, a richly embroidered mantle, and has a long, flow- 
ing beard and the same symbols of speech in front of 
him. This figure, Charnay thinks, also represents Quet- 
zalcoatl. There is a figure or a statue standing on a 
pyramid with a peculiar head-dress, a garment or flowing 
robe with crosses upon it, but which has no beard. This 
statue, Dr. Hamy thinks, represents Quetzalcoatl, for he 
recognizes the symbols of that hero, the cross and the 
robe. The tablet of the cross, No. 2, at Palenque, Dr. 
Brinton thinks, represents Quetzalcoatl, as it contains 
the bird on the summit of the cross, and represents two 
figures as offering sacrifice to the bird. With as much 
reason we may identify the shrine or temple with the 
three tablets, as the shrine of the goddess Centeotl, the 
wife of Tlaloc, for there are three figures on the piers 
of this temple which represent a female with a child in 
the arms, which is the emblem of this goddess among 
the Nahuas." — Myths and Symbols, pp. 405, 406. 

Itzamna, the god of the rising sun among the Mayas 
at the time of the Conquest, was also worshiped by the 
ancient inhabitants of Chiapas and Yucatan, if we can 
rely upon the testimony of the monuments. He was 
symbolized by a tapir and a human hand, and tapir 
snouts and human hands are found both in the Codices 
and upon the monuments. In the Troano and Dresden 
Codices Itzamna appears with a snout, and with a tusk 
protruding from each side of his mouth. At Uxmal he 
is represented by the so-called "elephant trunks," which 
have been made the basis of so many conjectures as to 
the Asiatic origin of the builders. At Kabah he appears 
again in an inscription holding a serpent in his hand. 
And at Palenque he is represented on various masks and 



460 



CVMORAH REVISITED 



statues by the characteristic tapir snout, and on certain 
slate tablets from the same region by the sacred tapir 
and the human hand. These symbols prove beyond 
doubt that in ancient as well as in modern times Itzamna 
was worshiped as a god by the Maya people. 

In the sixteenth century many of the tribes of Amer- 
ica worshiped the human organs of generation. The 
early missionaries found phallic worship in Yucatan, 
Nicaragua, Honduras, Tlascala, Mexico, Panuco and 
Peru. But the sculptured phalli from all these sections 
prove conclusively that it was also practiced by the 
ancient peoples. The evidences of this are co clear that 
Stephens says : "The ornaments upon the external cor- 
nice of several large buildings" — in Yucatan — "actually 
consisted of membra conjuncta in coitu, too plainly 
sculptured to be misunderstood. And, if this were not 
sufficient testimony, more was found in the isolated and 
scattered representations of the membrum verile, so ac- 
curate that even the Indians recognized the object, and 
invited the attention of Mr. Catherwood to the originals 
of some of his drawings as yet unpublished." — Native 
Races, Vol. III., p. 504. Phalli have also been discovered 
among the antiquities of the Mound Builders, the Peru- 
vians and at Copan, though not at Palenque, where, says 
Bancroft, "there is not among the many tablets or deco- 
rations in stucco a single figure which would be offen- 
sive to the most prudish modesty." — Native Races, Vol. 
IV., p. 358. 

The evidences of ancient sun-worship are also to be 
found among the antiquities. "Sun-worship," says Fos- 
ter, "practiced by the ancient inhabitants of Central 
America, Mexico, by the Natchez Indians, and undoubt- 
edly by the Mound Builders, can be traced back to the 
remotest antiquity." — Prehistoric Races, p. 311. Sun 



CUMORAII REVISITED 



461 



symbols have been found in Peru, at Copan, at Teoti- 
huacan and in the Mississippi Valley. 

6. The effigy mounds of North America strongly indi- 
cate that the Mound Builders zvere animal worshipers. 

It has already been stated that the North American 
Indian tribes worshiped beasts, birds and reptiles of 
various kinds, such as the dog, coyote, eagle, owl and 
rattlesnake. The effigy mounds prove that the Mound 
Builders did the same. The effigies are found chiefly 
in Wisconsin and adjoining territory, though a few are 
found in Ohio and Georgia. They are in the shape of 
men, lizards, serpents, bears, birds, turtles and spiders. 
In Ohio the two most important are the Great Serpent 
and the Alligator mound ; in Wisconsin, the Great Ele- 
phant. Rev. S. D. Peet says of their evident purpose : 
"The effigies may have been used as totems by the 
people, and thus show to us the animal divinities which 
were worshiped and the animal names given to the 
clans." — The Mound Builders, p. 24. 

In closing this chapter, it may be said that the sacred 
antiquities of the New World prove conclusively that 
the ancient Americans were animal, idol, sun and phallic 
worshipers, and that they offered human sacrifices. If 
they were Jews and Christians, why can not the evi- 
dences of it be found? 



462 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



CHAPTER IX. 

Have the Indian Languages Been Derived from the Hebrew and 
the Egyptian? — Supposed Hebrew Words in the American 
Languages — Comparisons Between Indian Words and the 
Words of Other Languages — American Languages Not a 
Wreck, but a Development — The Structure of the American 
Languages — The Diversity of the American Languages — 
Supposed Book of Mormon Words in American Nomencla- 
ture. 

As the philologist looks out over the broad field of 
human speech a number of questions naturally suggest 
themselves to him. What is the origin of these multi- 
farious forms? What is their antiquity? Through what 
mutations have they passed ? What relation do they bear 
to one another? These are questions that have per- 
plexed, and will doubtless always perplex, the student of 
human philology. 

Various theories, some of which have been fully 
refuted and given up, have been advanced to account 
for the origin of human speech. The main hypotheses 
are three: That human speech is a direct and completed 
gift from the Creator; that it is wholly a human inven- 
tion; and that it is an evolution from a natural germ. 
According to Sleicher, primordial language was simply 
an organism of vocal gestures. Gould Brown held that 
language is partly natural and partly artificial. Adam 
Smith and Dugald Stewart advocated that human speech 
is both a human creation and a human development by 
man's own artificial invention. According to Wedge- 
wood human language originated in the efforts of man 
to imitate the cries of nature, while Plato conceived 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



463 



language to be the invention of the gods and by them 
given to man. 1 Is it unreasonable to believe that lan- 
guage is both a gift and a development, given by the 
great Creator to man in the beginning in germinal form 
and developed since by human genius into the highly 
inflected tongues of the Aryan and Semitic races? 

The number of languages throughout the world has 
been differently estimated. According to one estimate 
there are 3,538, of which 987 are found in Asia, 587 in 
Europe, 300 in Africa, and 1,664 i n America. 2 These 
various languages, according to certain structural pecu- 
liarities, are grouped together in three grand divisions 
or classes, the monosyllabic, polysynthetic and inflec- 
tional. Monosyllabic languages are those in which the 
"roots, or sounds expressive only of the material or sub- 
stantial parts of things, are used." Polysynthetic lan- 
guages are those in which "a modifying termination, 
significant of the relations of ideas or things to each 
other, is affixed or glued to the root," while inflected 
languages are those in which the parts of speech are 
varied by declension or conjugation. The languages of 
the Chinese, Tibetans and, perhaps, the Japanese, belong 
to the monosyllabic group; those of the Americans and 
Turanians to the polysynthetic group, and those of the 
Aryans and Semites to the inflectional group. 3 

But few people are aware of the exceeding diversity 
and richness of the American tongues. The common 
opinion is that if an individual can speak "Indian," he 
can converse with any tribe on the continent, but this is 
not true. Every tribe has its own particular vocabulary 
and set of grammatical forms which distinguish its 



1 Bancroft, III: 6. 

2 Homiletic Review, Jan., 1885, p. 349. 

3 Bancroft, III: 8, 9. 



464 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



tongue from the tongues of the other tribes around it. 
So great is the diversity that exists that some philolo- 
gists have despaired utterly of ever tracing the various 
Indian languages back to a common point of divergence,: 
but Brinton mentions three characteristics which seem 
to be a common bond binding them together into one 
great linguistic body by themselves, distinct from all the 
other languages of the earth. These characteristics are : 
First, the prominence of pronouns and pronominal 
forms, exceeding in this respect even the Greek, from 
which they are called pronominal languages. Secondly, 
poly synthesis, or the power of running several words 
together, dropping the unimportant parts and retaining 
only those that are significant. And, thirdly, incorpora- 
tion, by which the object and manner of action are in- 
cluded in the verb or verbal expression. These charac- 
teristics, he thinks, constitute the American tongues a 
distinct body by themselves. 1 

At first the American languages were studied chiefly 
for two reasons : that certain political, trading and busi- 
ness interests might be subserved, and that the tribes 
speaking them might be made acquainted with the gospel 
of Jesus Christ. Later they were taken up and studied 
purely for scientific reasons, and so important have they 
been found as throwing light upon the psychology, rela- 
tionship, antiquity and migrations of the American tribes 
that they have come to have a strong influence in gov- 
erning the speculations of Americanists. Among the 
earlier students of the American languages, who carried 
on their investigations for purely scientific reasons, were 
Humboldt, Duponceau and Gallatin. In the writings of 
these philologists we do not find the crude absurdities 



1 "Essays of an Americanist," pp. 320, 321. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



465 



that appear in the pages of Adair, Boudinot and Priest, 
the Mormon "authorities." They came to the American 
tongues, not with a theory to prove, but for the sake of 
getting out of them only what they contained. Among 
later students of American philology none stand higher 
than Major J. W. Powell and Dr. D. G. Brinton. Pow- 
ell's excellent paper, "On the Evolution of Language," 
in the "First Report of the Bureau of American Ethnol- 
ogy," and Brinton's interesting chapters on American 
philology in his "Essays of an Americanist," are the 
sources from which I have obtained my information for 
this chapter on the structure of the American tongues. 

According to the Book of Mormon, the civilized an- 
cestors of the American Indians spoke and wrote two 
Old World languages — the Hebrew and the Egyptian — 
both of which, in course of time, became altered or 
changed. The Egyptian, in its changed or altered form, 
was called the "Reformed Egyptian." Moroni says of 
these languages : "And now, behold, we have written this 
record [Book of Mormon] according to our knowledge 
in the characters, which are called among us the re- 
formed Egyptian, being handed down and altered by us, 
according to our manner of speech. And if our plates 
had been sufficiently large, we should have written in 
Hebrew ; but the Hebrew hath been altered by us also ; 
and if we could have written in Hebrew, behold, ye 
would have had no imperfection in our record." — Mor- 
mon 4 : 8. From this Mormon writers claim that the In- 
dian languages are perversions of and variations and 
deviations from the Egyptian and the Hebrew, and that 
they still retain certain features in their etymology and 
syntax by which this relationship may be proved. 

In this chapter I expect to show that the American 
languages are not only devoid of any important resem- 



4 66 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



blances to the Hebrew and the Egyptian, but that, con- 
sidering their structure and diversity, it would be an 
impossibility for them to have been derived from these 
languages no longer ago than 600 B. C. 

SUPPOSED HEBREW WORDS IN THE AMERICAN LANGUAGES. 

To prove their claim that the American Indians are 
of Jewish descent, Mormon writers quote the statements 
of a number of the older authors relative to the similarity 
of the Hebrew and American tongues. 

Priest says : "Hebrew words are found among the 
American Indians in considerable variety." — The Book 
Unsealed, p. 32. 

Boudinot says : "Their language, in its roots, idiom 
and particular construction, appears to have the whole 
genius of the Hebrew; and what is very remarkable, and 
well worthy of serious attention, has most of the peculi- 
arities of the language, especially those in which it differs 
from most other languages." — A Voice of Warning, p. 
82. 

Adair says : "The Indian language and dialects appear 
to have the very idiom and genius of the Hebrew. Their 
words and sentences are expressive, concise, emphatical, 
sonorous and bold; and often, both in letters and signifi- 
cation, synonymous with the Hebrew language." — Tal- 
madge's Two Lectures, p. 46. 

And Mr. Stebbins says that in June, 1868, he heard 
an educated Seneca lecture in Van Buren County, Mich- 
igan, who said that "he could refer his hearers to 150 
words in the Seneca language which closely resembled 
the Hebrew." — Book of Mormon Lectures, p. 246. 

These quotations, which also appear in other Mormon 
works, are accepted by the Mormons as perfectly trust- 
worthy, and are looked upon as confirmatory of their 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



467 



claim. But while Priest was probably a very good har- 
ness-maker, Boudinot a very excellent gentleman, Adair 
a shrewd Indian trader, and the educated Seneca a well- 
meaning man, none of them were sufficiently well ac- 
quainted with the Indian languages as a body to speak 
authoritatively, and their opinions are directly at variance 
with those of Humboldt, Duponceau, Gallatin, Brinton 
and Powell, men who have been experts in American 
philology. It might be true that there are 150 words in 
the Seneca language resembling Hebrew words, and yet 
not prove that that language was derived from the He- 
brew. It takes something more than a few verbal resem- 
blances to prove lingual relationship. 

The following is a list of comparisons, between sup- 
posed Indian and Hebrew words, compiled by Adair, 1 
who was a trader among the Creeks and neighboring 
tribes for forty years, and presented by the Latter-day 
Saints as evidence of the truthfulness of their claim that 
the American Indian is a descendant of the Jew. These 
comparisons, with others, are found in such Mormon 
works as Phillips' "Book of Mormon Verified," Stebbins' 
"Book of Mormon Lectures," and Etzenhouser's "Book 
Unsealed," the last named being the work from which I 
have taken this list. 



English. 



Indian. 



Hebrew or Chaldee. 



Jehovah, 

God, 

Jah, 

Shiloah, 

Heavens, 

Father, 

Man, 

Woman, 

Wife, 

Thou, 

His wife, 

This man, 

Nose, 

Roof of a house, 
Winter, 



Yohewah,* 
Ale,* 

Yah or Wah, 

Shilu, 

Chemim.f 

Abba,* 

Ish.f Ishte,* 

Ishto,t 

Awah,* 

Keah,$ 

Liani,f 

Uwoh,$ 

Nichiri.f 

Taubana-ora,t 

Kora,* 



Jahoveh. 

Ale, Aleim. 

Jah. 

Shiloh. 

Shemim. 

Abba. 

Ish. 

Ishto. 

Ewah, Eve. 
Ka. 

Lihene. 

Huah. 

Neheri. 

Debonaou. 

Korah, 



*"The Ten Tribes," p. 69. 



468 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



English. 



Hebrew or Chaldee. 



Canaan, 
To pray, 1 
Now, 

Hind parts, 
Do, 

To blow, 
Rushing wind, 
Ararat, or high moun- 



Canaai,* 
Phale,* 
Na,* 



Canaan. 
Phalace. 
Na. 



Kesh,* 
Jennais,* 
Phaubac,f 



Jannon. 
Phauhe. 
Ruach. 
Ararat. 



Kish. 



Rowah, 
Ararat,! 



tain, 
Assembly, 
My skin, 
Very hot, 

Praise to the first Cause, 



Kurbet,t 
Nora,f 

Heru hara or hslc.,* 
Hallehuwah,* 



Grabit. 
Ourni. 
Hara hara. 
Hallelujah. 



While this list has been repeatedly used by the Mor- 
mons, one thing is very noticeable : they have always 
been very careful not to betray the names of the tribes 
from whose languages these supposed Hebrew words are 
said to come. Can it be that they are fearful lest an 
investigation expose the inaccuracy of these compari- 
sons? However, by consulting "The Ten Tribes of 
Israel," pp. 73-75, by Mr. Timothy Jenkins, I find that 
those words marked with a * are said to be Creek, those 
marked with a t are said to be Caribbee, and those 
marked with a $ are said to belong to the languages of 
the Mohegans and kindred tribes. 

That there may be a slight similarity between some of 
the words in the Hebrew and Indian languages I do not 
deny, but these similarities, if they exist, are so insignifi- 
cant that they must be considered purely accidental and 
can have no weight whatever in determining the origin 
of the American Indian, especially when the structure of 
his languages is so very different from the structure of 
the Hebrew. Theorists have too often yielded to the 
temptation, in finding an Indian word identical, or nearly 
so, with a Hebrew word in meaning, and more or less 
closely resembling it in sound, to add a sound or omit a 
syllable in order to make the resemblance closer. This 



1 Mt. Etzenhouser has "to pay," but this is incorrect, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



469 



very thing has been done in the case of many of the 
above-given comparisons, as I shall show. Says George 
Bancroft: "The ingenious scholar may find analogies in 
language, customs, institutions and religions between the 
aborigines of America and any nation whatever of the 
Old World; the pious curiosity of Christendom, and not 
a peculiar coincidence, has created a special disposition 
to discover a connection between them and the Hebrews." 
— History of the United States, Vol. III., pp. 211, 212. 

Where Adair, Boudinot and Priest could find a great 
many words among a few tribes resembling the words of 
only one Old World language, the Hebrew, Squier, a 
man without a theory to prove and a careful investigator, 
asserts that in all the tongues of North and South Amer- 
ica he could find only 187 common to foreign languages. 
Out of this number 104 occur in the languages of Asia 
and Australia, forty-three in those of Europe, and forty 
in those of Africa. 1 

I now invite the reader's attention to the Hebrew or 
Chaldee words in Mr. Etzenhouser's list of comparisons. 
While some of them are undoubtedly correct, in others 
the spelling does not exactly represent the sound of the 
real Hebrew words, while still others I fail to find at all. 



English. Hebrew Hebrew. Chaldee? 

(Etzenhouser). 



Jehovah, 


Jahoveh, 


Jehovah or 


Jahu, 


Jahveh. 


God, 


Ale, Aleim, 


El, Elohim, 




Elah. 


Shiloh, 


Shiloh, 


Shiloh, 




Shelam. 


Heavens, 


Shemim, 


Shamayim, 




Shemayin. 


Father, 


Abba, 


Ab, 




Abba. 


Man, 


Ish, 


Ish, 




Enash. 


Woman, 


Ishto, 


Ishshah, 




Ittah. 


Wife, 


Ewah, Eve, 


Ishshah, 




Shegal. 


Thou, 


Ka, 


Att, attah, 


(ka 


Ant. 




mas. gend. suf- 








fix only), 






His wife, 


Lihene, 


Ishto, 




Sheglohi. 



1 "Types of Mankind," p. 281. 

2 For assistance in compiling these Hebrew and Chaldee lists I am 
greatly indebted to my friend, Rev. J. S. Howk, D.D., of Jeffersonville, Ind. 



4/0 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



English. 
This man, 



Huah, 



Hebrew. 



Haish hazeh, ha Haden. 



Hebrew. Chaldee. 



hu. 



Nose, 

Roof, 

Winter, 

Canaan, 

To pray, 

Now, 

Hind parts, 
Do, 

To blow, 
Rushing wind, 
Assembly, 
My skin, 
Very hot, 



Phalac(e), 
Na, 
Kish, 



Hara hara, 



Korah, 
Canaan, 



Tannon, 
Phauhe, 
Ruach, 
Grabit, 
Ourni, 



Neheri, 
Debonaou(r), 



Achor, Achorah. 



Ori, Gildi. 
Charah, Azah. 



Abad, asah, Abad. 
Puach, Guach. 
Ruach, Ruach. 



Palal, Beah. 
Na, Kean. 



Moed, miqra, Kenashah. 



Choreph, Chereph. 
Canaan, Canaan. 



Aph, nechirim, Anpin. 
Gag, Gaggah. 



It is not claimed that the Hebrew and Chaldee words 
in the third and fourth columns are the only equivalents 
of the English words given, but that they come the near- 
est to the Hebrew-Chaldee terms given by Mr. Etzen- 
houser, or are the ones which more frequently occur and 
were more commonly used. 

In Air. Etzenhouser's list the words Shiloh, abba, ish, 
ka, Canaan, na and ruach are spelled correctly; ale cor- 
rectly represents the sounds of el; while Jahoveh, in the 
vowels of its first and last syllables, differs from Jehovah. 
Of the rest, lihene, debonaou, kish, jannon and grabit I 
have not been able to find ; while Aleim is evidently a 
corruption of Elohim, shemim of shamayim, ishto of 
ishshah, huah of ha hn (from ha, the article, and hu, the 
personal pronoun), neheri of nechirim, korah of choreph, 
phalace of palal, phauhe of puach, ourni of ori and hara 
hara of charah. 

As much liberty has been taken with the Indian 
words. According to Jenkins, Yohezvah, ale, abba, ishte, 
awah, kora, Canaai, phalc, na, kesh, jennais, hern hara 
or hala and halleluwah are Creek; the rest are either 
Caribbee or Mohegan words or words from the lan- 
guages of northern tribes. As I have not been able to 
obtain a grammar or definer of either the Caribbee or 
'Mohegan tongues, the words from these languages will 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



471 



be passed unnoticed, except those for "man," "woman" 
and "nose," which, fortunately, I have found in a Carib- 
bee vocabulary in Brinton's "The American Race," pp. 
35i, 35 2 - 

I have been, however, more fortunate in obtaining 
vocabularies of the Creek, furnished by Mr. Charles 
Gibson, of Eufaula; Mr. Jeff D. Ward, of Atoka, and 
Mrs. A. E. W. Robertson, of Muskogee, Indian Terri- 
tory. Mr. Ward also kindly obtained for me vocabu- 
laries of both the Choctaw and the Cherokee. 

Having seen the name of Mr. Charles Gibson, the 
Creek fable writer, in a magazine, I wrote to him the 
following letter, which explains itself: 

Buchanan, Michigan, Aug. 6, 1903. 
Mr. Charles Gibson, Eufaula, Indian Territory. 

Dear Sir — Will you kindly give me information in regard to 
the following? I have a work entitled "The Ten Tribes of 
Israel," in which a comparison is made between certain words 
in the Hebrew and Indian tongues, some of them said to be 
Creek, as follows : 

English. Creek. Hebrew. 

God, Ale, Ale. 

Father, Abba, Abba. 

Wife, Awah, Eve, Eweh. 

Winter, Kora, Cora. 

Very hot, Heru, hara or hala, Hara hara. 

Now, Na, ■ N'a. - 1 ' 

Hind parts, Kesh, Kish. 

To pray, Phale, Phalac. 

Man or chief, Ishte, Ish. 

Will you kindly inform me if these comparisons are correct? 
If they are not, will you give me the correct Creek word for, 
each? Thanking you for your courtesy and hoping to hear 
from you, I am, Yours truly, Charles A. Shook. 

Mr. Gibson is perhaps as good an authority on his 
language as can be found in the Indian Territory. Of 
him the Twin Territories for July, 1903, says: "Nearly* 
every one who knows anything of Indian Territorv, or 
the Creek tribe of Indians, has heard of Charles Gibson. 



4/2 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



His fables, published at sometime or other in nearly every 
paper of Oklahoma or Indian Territory, together with 
'Gibson's Rifle Shots. ' have made for him a name that 
could scarcely be obtained by any other achievement.''' 
To my letter Mr. Gibson sent the following reply : 

Eufaula. Indian Territory, Aug. 9, 1903. 
Mr. Charles A. Shook. Buchanan. Michigan. 

Dear Sir — Yours of the 6th inst. to hand, and I will answer 
your letter, etc., etc.. to the best of my ability. First, the defini- 
tions to list of words in your list. 

English. Creek. 

God, Hi-sak-ita-missee. 

Father, Chuth-kee. 

Wife. Chi-hi-wa. 

Winter, Thlof-foo. 

Very hot, Hi-ye-ta. 

Xow, Hi-yome. 

Hind parts, Sook-so. 

To pray, Eme-ko-sar-pi-ta. 

Man. ' Ho-non-wa. 

Chief, Micco. 

Xow. it is almost an impossibility to pronounce these words 
right by the way they are spelled by the English letters. They 
use the English alphabet, but have sounds that are not English — 
say the letter C is sounded chee, R is hie, V is ah. W is we, etc., 
etc. Therefore it is a hard matter to sound Creek words with 
the English letters, but you can see by the names or the inter- 
pretations of the words I send you that they are very- different 
from yours. This is the Creek, but understand the Choctaw, 
Chickasaw and Cherokee languages are very different from my 
language; but there is very little resemblance in the others, as I 
understand a few words of these other tribes. Xow, the Choc- 
taw, when he mentions God. says Abba Pinky; when he speaks 
of a certain part of the hind parts of anything, he says Iskish. 
These are as near as I can come to your words. . . . 

Yours, Chas. Gibson. 

The reader can readily see that the Creek words as 
given by Mr. Gibson are very different from those said 
to be Creek which I sent to him. and which appear in 
Mormon works. To verify these comparisons I obtained, 
through Mr. Jeff D. Ward, another list of the Creek and 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



473 



also lists of the Cherokee and Choctaw. I have reasoned 
that, as Adair was a trader among all these tribes for 
forty years, some of these words said to be Creek, but 
which are not Creek, may be corruptions from these other 
tongues. Mr, Ward's Cherokee and Choctaw lists prove 
that in at least two instances my reasoning has been cor- 
rect. His comparisons are as follows : 

English. Creek. Cherokee. Choctaw. 

God, Hesaketamesee, Oo-neh-lah-ner-he, Che-ho-wa. 

Father, Chuthke, Eh-dor-der, Ank-ki. 

Wife, Hiwa, Oo-dah-lee ( hi s Tek-chi. 

wife), 

Winter, Thluffo, Goh-ler, On-na-fa. 

Very hot, Hiyehethle, Oo-de-leh-ger, Lash-pa feh-na. 

Now, Mucher, Nah-qwoo, Him-ak. 

Hind parts, Yupa futcher, Oh-ne-de-dler, Ha-pul-lo. 

To pray, Emekosupeta, E-dar-dar-dor-le- Im-mil-bush-sha. 

ster, 

Man, Honunwa, Ah-skar-yah, Hat-tak. 

Chief, Mikko, Oo-ger-we-yu-he, Min-ko. 

The Creek words in this list agree very well with 
those furnished by Mr. Gibson. The words for "God," 
"father," "winter," "to pray," "man" and "chief" are 
practically the same. The word for "wife," as given by 
Mr. Ward, is hiwa; as given by Mr. Gibson it is chihiwa, 
which according to Mrs. Robertson means "your wife." 
Mrs. Robertson also informs me that hiyeta and hiye- 
hethle "express the same meaning." According to her 
list, hiyome, or hiyomat, and mucher, or mucu, are both 
equivalents of the English word "now." "Suksu," she 
says, "is given as 'the hip' in Loughridge's lexicon. Yupu 
means behind, and fuccu towards." 

It seems certain that some of the words in the Mor- 
mon list, said to be Creek, are not Creek at all ; others 
are corruptions of real Creek words ; and still others are 
introductions from the English tongue. Ale is not the 
Creek word for "God," which is Isakita immissi, as given 
by Gatschet, 1 or Esaugetuh Eniissee, as given by Brin- 



"Migration Legend of the Creeks," Vol. I., p. 215. 



474 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



ton, 1 which is the same word with a broader pronuncia- 
tion. Both Messrs. Ward and Gibson spell it differently. 
The Cherokee word also has no resemblance to ale; 
neither have the two Choctaw words for "God," Chito- 
kaka and Chihowa. The word for "father," abba, does 
not occur in any of these tongues, but Gibson says that 
the Choctaw title for divinity is abba pinky. I have care- 
fully looked Watkins' "Complete Choctaw Definer" 
through and fail to find it, but Brinton gives the Choctaw 
title for divinity ynba paik, which, he says, means, "Our 
Father Above." 2 By consulting the "Definer," I find that 
this title is from uba (pronounced with a short u), 
"above," and piki, "Our Father." It is altogether prob- 
able that Adair's azvah comes from hiwa. Neither the 
Creek nor the Choctaw words for "winter" sound like 
kora, but the Cherokee word, gohler, slightly resembles 
it in sound, and Jenkins says that "korah is their word 
for winter with the Cherokee Indians, as it is with the 
Hebrews." — The Ten Tribes, p. 119. The words heru, 
hara or hala have evidently been derived from hiyehethle, 
for Airs. Robertson says that here, pronounced hehle, 
"after a word adds the force of very." The word na, 
said to be Creek, is probably the first syllable of the 
Cherokee nahqwoo, or naquo, as Airs. Robertson spells 
it. Gibson says that the Choctaw word for "hind parts" 
is iskish; Watkins gives ishkish as the Choctaw equiva- 
lent of our word "rump." Kish, ir Hebrew, means "bow 
or power ;" achor is the correct word for "hind parts." 
The words for "to pray" bear no resemblance to phale. 
Jenkins gives ishte as the Creek word for "man" or 
"chief;" this is, without doubt, from istif which is a 



1 "Myths," p. 67. 

2 "Myths," p. 65, Footnote. 

3 "Migration Legend," Vol. I., p. 203. 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



475 



generic term meaning person, into which the sound of 
h has been inserted to make it more closely resemble the 
Hebrew word ish. Isti means a person, man, woman or 
child ; ish means a male. Latter-day Saints tell us fur- 
ther that the Indians were in the habit of using the sacred 
ejaculation, "Hallelujah," and Jenkins says: "In the 
Choctaw nation they often sing 'Halleluyah,' intermixed 
with their lamentations." — The Ten Tribes, p. 132. Else- 
where (p. 144) he informs us that both the Choctaw and 
Cherokee tribes use the word. The Creeks had a sacred 
chant, hi-yo-yu or hay-ay-al-gi. 1 The Cherokees em- 
ployed the sacred, but meaningless, chant, ha-wi-ye-e-hi, 
in their "Groundhog Dance;" he-el hay-u-ya han-iwa, 
etc., was employed by their bear-hunters to attract the 
bear ; while ha-wi-ye-hy-u-we was a part of one of their 
baby songs. 2 Hayuya falling on the ears of an English- 
man might be mistaken for "hallelujah." Lastly, the 
words for "Jehovah" (Yohezvah in the Cherokee, Che- 
howa in the Choctaw, and Chihufa in the Creek) are not 
original words at all, and the same may be said for 
Shiloh, Canaan and other Old Testament names, but are 
simply the efforts of these tribes to pronounce our Scrip- 
tural terms. In reply to my request that she give me her 
opinion on the origin of these Indian equivalents of 
"Jehovah," Mrs. Robertson, under date of June 24, 1904, 
writes : "I have not the least idea that Yehowa is any- 
thing else than our English word adapted to the Chero- 
kee sounds, just as are the Creek and Choctaw, for I 
think the Choctaw Chehowa was derived in the same 
way." This is proved further by the fact that the word 
"Jehovah" is a title of modern invention, dating no fur- 
ther back than the seventeenth century. In the con- 

1 "Myths," p. 95, Footnote. 

2 "Nineteenth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," pp. 279, 401. 



4/6 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



sonantal writing of the Hebrews the word stands J-h-v-h, 
into which a scholar proposed inserting the vowels e, o 
and a from edonai, the word for "Lord." Aramaic 
papyri, discovered near Assuan in Egypt a few years ago 
and dating from the fifth century B. C, gives the name 
of the Hebrew God as "Jahu," and, as this is the name 
found in certain Babylonian business documents of that 
period, it is probable that it is the ancient name in place 
of "Jehovah." This makes it positively impossible for 
Yohewahj Chihowa and Chili u fa to be original Indian 
words derived from the Hebrew, for ''Jehovah" itself 
is now only about three centuries old. 1 The Creek 
word for panther or catamount is katsa; 2 why not argue 
their German origin because it so very closely resembles 
the German word for cat, katze, both in sound and 
signification ? 

A number of the supposed Indian words in Mr. Etzen- 
houser's list are declared by Jenkins to come from the 
Caribbee or Carib language. These are chemim, ish, 
ishto, Hani, nichiri, taubana-ora, phaubac, kurbet and 
nora, the words for "heavens," "man," "woman," "his 
wife," "nose," "roof," "to blow," "assembly" and "my 
skin." As I have not been able to obtain a Caribbee 
definer, all of these words will have to be passed un- 
noticed with the exception of three. In Brinton's "The 
American Race," pp. 351, 354, I have found the original 
words for "man," "woman" and "nose'' in eight of the 
Carib dialects. These dialects are : Bakairi, Motilone, 
Gauque, Tamanaca, Roucouyenne, Macuchi, Maquiritare 
and Cumanagoto. Of these dialects the Bakairi has the 
best claims to antiquity. Brinton remarks : "The oldest 
existing forms of the Carib stock are believed by Yon 



1 See "Fresh Lights from the Ancient Monuments," p. 62. 

2 "Migration Legend," Vol. I., p. 155. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



477 



den Steinen to be preserved in the Bakairi, which I have 
accordingly placed first in the vocabularies of this fam- 
ily." This being true, if Hebrew words are found in the 
Carib language at all, we shall be more likely to find them 
in this dialect, but here we look in vain. The Carib words 
for "man," "woman" and "nose" are : 

Guaque, 



Man, 

Woman, 

Nose, 

Man, 

Woman, 

Nose, 



Bakairi, 
uguruto, 
pekoto, 
kchandai, 
Roucouyenne, 
okiri, 
oli, 

yemna, 



Motilone, 
yakano, 
esate, 
ona, 

Macuchi, 
uratae, 
nery, 
yuna, 



guire, 

guerechi, 

onari, 

Maquiritare, 
rahuwari, 
wiri, 
y onari, 



Tamanaca, 
nuani, 
aica, 



Cumanagoto. 
guarayto. 
guariche. 
ona. 



Of the words for "man," not one bears the faintest 
similarity in sound to ish; esate, to one desperately deter- 
mined to prove his theory, might suggest ishto; while 
nichiri is undoubtedly a corruption of onari or y onari. 

Thus, as the reader can see, by a system of inexcusable 
orthographical jugglery, Adair and his followers have 
made a number of comparisons which, under close in- 
vestigation, are shown to be erroneous, but which are 
confidently held up by the Mormons as proof of their 
claim that the American Indians are descendants of the 
Jews. 

COMPARISONS BETWEEN INDIAN WORDS AND THE WORDS OF 
OTHER LANGUAGES. 

But even if it were proved beyond a doubt that certain 
words in the Indian languages agree with certain Hebrew 
words both in sound and meaning, it would no more 
prove their Hebrew origin than the Chinese, Assyrian 
and Welsh words prove their descent from the languages 
of the Chinese, Assyrians and Welsh. 

Dr. Le Plongeon is reported as saying: "The Maya 
language seems to be one of the oldest tongues spoken by 
man, since it contains words and expressions of all, or 



4/8 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



nearly all, of the known polished' languages of the earth." 
— Ruins Revisited, pp. 177, 178. 

The reader should remember that the slight resem- 
blances which exist are not claimed by philologists to be 
the result of ethnical descent, but rather are looked upon 
as purely accidental. This is the opinion of most of those 
who have made the American languages a special study. 

On the similarity between the Maya and the Greek, 
Le Plongeon says : "One-third of the tongue is pure 
Greek." There is also a marked similarity between the 
names of five cities in Asia Minor, of 140 A. D., and a 
corresponding number in Central America. 

Armenian Cities. Central American Localities. 
Choi, Chol-ula. 
Colua, Colua-can. 
Zuivana, Zuivan. 
Cholima, Colima. 
Zalissa, Xalisco. 

— Atlantis, p. 178. 
• 

Analogies between the American and Chinese lan- 
guages are numerous. "Analogies have been found, or 
thought to exist, between the languages of several of the 
American tribes and that of the Chinese. . . . The simi- 
larity between the Otomi and the Chinese has been re- 
marked by several writers." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 
39- 

In 1857 Henley, a Chinese scholar, "published a list 
of words in the Chinese and Indian languages to show 
that they were of the same origin." Here is the list: 

Indian. Chinese. English. 

Nanga, Nang, Man. 

Yisoo, Soa, Hand. 

Keoka, Keok, Foot. 

Aekasoo, Soo, Beard. 

Yueta, Yuet, Moon. 

Yeeta, Yat, Sun. 

Utyta, Hoto, Much. 

Leelum, Eelung, Deafness. 

Hoyapa, Hoah, Good. 

Apa, Apa, Father. 

Araa, Ama, Mother. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



479 



Indian. 



Chinese. English. 



Kochae, 
Nagam, 
Koolae, 
Koochue, 
Chookoo, 



Kole, 



Ako, Brother. 

Tochae, Thanks. 

Yam, Drunk. 

Kukay, Her. 



Chuekoo, Hog. 
Kowchi, Dog. 



— North Americans of Antiquity, p. 203. 



In "Atlantis," p. 435, Donnelly also gives a list of 
comparisons between the Otomi and the Chinese, many 
of which are as striking as any found in the Hebrew- 
Indian lists of Adair, Boudinot and the Latter-day Saints. 

Says Bancroft: "Bossu found some similarity between 
the language of the Natchez of Louisiana and the Chi- 
nese." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 39. 

He says of Warden: "The last-mentioned author also 
quotes a long list of analogies between the written lan- 
guage of the Chinese and the gesture language of the 
northern Indians." — Ibid. 

He quotes Taylor : "The Chinese accent can be traced 
throughout the Indian (Digger) language." 

Bradford says : "It is perhaps somewhat more than 
an accidental coincidence that the Mexican particle tsin, 
which was usually added to the names of their kings, is 
identical with the Chinese tsin, and the Indo-Chinese 
asyang, an affix signifying Lord." — American Antiqui- 
ties, p. 311. 

I am satisfied that more words can be found in our 
American tongues approaching Chinese words in both 
sound and meaning than can be found approaching the 
Hebrew, yet it would be the height of absurdity to use 
this item of evidence as proof of their Mongolian origin. 

Analogies are said to exist between the Welsh and the 
dialects of certain tribes. Bancroft gives the following 
incident : "A certain Lieutenant Roberts states that in 
1801 he met an Indian chief at Washington who spoke 



48o 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Welsh 'as fluently as if he had been born and brought up 
in the vicinity of Snowdon.' He said it was the language 
of his nation, the Asguaws, who lived eight hundred 
miles northwest of Philadelphia." — Native Races, Vol. 
V., pp. 119, 120. 

Following this, he mentions another instance where 
Welshmen freely conversed with the natives in Welsh. 
"Another officer, one Captain Davies, relates that while 
stationed at a trading-post, among the Illinois Indians, he 
was surprised to find that several Welshmen who be- 
longed to his company could converse readily with the 
aborigines in Welsh." — Ibid, p. 120. 

Donnelly gives several comparisons between words of 
the Mandan and Welsh languages : 

English, Mandan. Welsh. 

I, Me, Mi. 

You, Ne, Chwi. 

He, E, A. 

She, Ea, E. 

It, Ount, Hwynt. 

We, Noo, Ni. 

They, Eonah, Hona (fem.). 

No (or there is not), Megosh, Nagoes. 

No, Na. 

Head, Pan, Pen. 

The Great Spirit. Maho Peneta, Mawr Pensethir. 

On Scandinavian traces Bancroft says : "Brasseur de 
Bourbourg has f'.und many words in the languages of 
Central America which bear, he thinks, marked Scandi- 
navian traces ; little can be proven by this, however, since 
he finds as many other words that as strongly resemble 
Latin, Greek, English, French, and many other lan- 
guages." — Native Races, Vol. V., p. 115. 

But, what is more surprising still, our modern Eng- 
lish bears a similarity to the Maya in some few of its 
words. Dellenbaugh says : "Brinton has shown that a 
number of Maya words resemble our English words of 
the same meanings, as bateel and battle, hoi and hole, 
hun and one, lum and loam, pol and poll (head), potum 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



481 



and pot, pul and pull, and so on; but nobody has yet 
ventured to deduce from this that the Mayas are first 
cousins of the English/' — North Americans of Yester- 
day, pp. 25, 26. 

I might carry these comparisons out to greater length, 
but I believe that these are sufficient to show the absurd- 
ity of trying to link the American Indians to the Jews by 
the words that they utter. The words that are alike in 
both languages are exceedingly few, on account of which 
they must be considered purely accidental. If this argu- 
ment proves anything, it proves that the American In- 
dians are descendants of about every nation under the 
face of the sun. 

Dellenbaugh says : "Because of certain similarities of 
physique, of words, or of myths, or of customs, however 
slight, the Amerinds have been identified with almost 
every people under the sun. These similarities are only 
such as might occur where similar organisms are con- 
tinuously subjected to similar conditions, and the really 
remarkable fact is that there are not more and even 
closer resemblances." — North Americans of Yesterday, 
P- 25. 

And Foster says : "As the human voice articulates not 
more than twenty distinct sounds, whatever resemblances 
there may be in the particular words of different lan- 
guages are of no ethnic value, but it is upon this test 
that many American writers have undertaken to trace the 
origin of the red man." — Prehistoric Races, p. 319. 

THE AMERICAN LANGUAGES NOT A WRECK, BUT A 
DEVELOPMENT. 

It will hardly be denied that in point of structure the 
American tongues are inferior to the Hebrew, so if they 
have come from that language it must have been by a 



482 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



process of degeneration and not development. But the 
American tongues are not wrecks ; they are primitive 
forms that have passed through various changes and 
stages of development without succeeding in disenthrall- 
ing themselves from nature. 

Foster says : ''The language of the American Indian 
throws no light upon his origin, except that that origin 
was so far remote that all attempts, by this clue, to estab- 
lish a common center of human creation are utterly 
futile." — Prehistoric Races, p. 318. 

George Bancroft says : "It has been asked if our In- 
dians were not the wrecks of more civilized nations. 
Their language refutes the hypothesis ; every one of its 
forms is a witness that their ancestors were, like them- 
selves, not yet disenthralled from nature." — History of 
the United States, Vol. III., p. 265. 

Gallatin says that "they bear the impress of primitive 
languages, and assumed their form from natural causes, 
and afford no proof of their being derived from a nation 
in a more advanced state of civilization, and that they 
attest the antiquity of the population — an antiquity the 
earliest we are permitted to assume." — Prehistoric Races, 
p. 321. 

Hayden says : "No theories of derivation from the 
Old World have stood the test of grammatical construc- 
tion. All traces of the fugitive tribes of Israel, supposed 
to be found here, are again lost." — Ibid, p. 319. 

And Dellenbaugh says : "Furthermore, no authentic 
trace of any Old World language thus far has been found 
on this continent, and the only Asiatic language now 
known to be allied to an American is that of a branch of 
the Eskimo family which crossed from this side within 
the last three hundred years." — North Americans of Yes- 
terday, pp. 428, 429. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



483 



These declarations place the theory that the American 
languages are wrecks of the Hebrew and the Egyptian in 
no very good light. 

THE STRUCTURE OF THE AMERICAN LANGUAGES. 

The languages of America possess certain structural 
peculiarities which distinguish them from the languages 
of all the rest of the earth. Bancroft writes: "The re- 
searches of the few philologists who have given Ameri- 
can languages their study have brought to light the fol- 
lowing facts. First, that a relationship exists among all 
the tongues of the northern and southern continents; and 
that while certain characteristics are found in common 
throughout all the languages of America, these languages 
are as a whole sufficiently peculiar to be distinguishable 
from the speech of all the other races of the world." — 
Native Races, Vol. III., p. 553. 

Chief among these peculiarities is the power to ex- 
press an entire thought in a word of sometimes fifteen or 
twenty syllables, known as a "bunch word," the principle 
of which is called polysynthesis, agglutination or incor- 
poration. Peter Stephen Duponceau, who was among 
the first to remark upon this pecu'iarity, defines polysyn- 
thesis in the following words : "A polysynthetic or syn- 
tactic construction of language is that in which the great- 
est number of ideas are comprised in the least number of 
words." — Essays of an Americanist, p. 352. 

As an illustration of this principle, we have the Chero- 
kee word, winitazvtigeginaliskazvlungtanazvnelitisesti, giv- 
en by Bancroft, which translated into English means 
"they will by that time have nearly finished granting 
favors from a distance to thee and me." 1 In this single 



1 Bancroft, III: 555. 



484 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



word of forty-one letters is expressed a thought which 
requires a sentence of seventeen English words to express. 

Of all the Old World tongues, the Basque of France 
comes the nearest to the American languages in this poly- 
synthetic peculiarity. In the Basque, however, it is lim- 
ited to a few parts of speech, while in the American lan- 
guages it extends to all. Says Dellenbaugh : "While the 
Basque more nearly resembles the Amerind languages 
than does any other Old World tongue, it stops short of 
the incorporating power of that of the Amerinds. In 
Basque this is restricted to the verb and some pronominal 
elements, but in the Amerind it embraces all parts of 
speech." — North Americans of Yesterday, p. 32. 

Bancroft mentions certain other peculiarities of the 
Indian languages, such as the repetition of a syllable to 
form a plural ; the use of frequentatives and duals ; gen- 
der applied to the third person of the verb ; the conver- 
sion of nouns into verbs, and the classification of things 
into animate and inanimate classes. 1 To these may be 
added still others, as given by Brinton, such as the utter 
absence of both conjunctions and relative pronouns ; the 
want of tense forms ; the paucity of adjectives ; the rarity 
of prepositions and the absence of articles. 2 

In the Indian languages nouns are connotive ; they do 
not simply denote the name of an object, but also some 
quality or characteristic of the object. Thus, in many 
tribes there is no distinct word for "father," but words 
signifying "my father," "your father" and "his father." 
Powell says that "a simply denotive name is rarely 
found." Frequently the verb is used for the noun, as in 
Ute the word for bear means "he seizes" or "the hugger." 

"Pronouns are only to a limited extent independent 



1 Bancroft, III: 556. 

2 "Essays of an Americanist," pp. 404, 405. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



48S 



words." — Powell. Of free pronouns there are two kinds, 
personal and demonstrative, of which the latter is more 
frequently used. Thus the Indian more often says "that 
man" than "he." Pronouns occur to a large extent with 
verbs as prefixes, infixes and suffixes. These are termed 
article pronouns ; have singular, dual and plural forms, 
and are an important consideration in the conjugation of 
the verb, pointing out gender, person and number. Rela- 
tive pronouns and conjunctions do not occur. In speak- 
ing of these, Brinton says : "You will be surprised to 
hear that there is no American language, none that I 
know, which possesses either of these parts of speech." 

Adjectives occur but rarely. "Few American tongues 
have any adjectives, the Cree, for instance, not a dozen 
in all." — Brinton. Usually, as has been mentioned, the 
qualities or characteristics of a thing are implied or 
designated in the name of the thing. 

"Prepositions are equally rare, and articles are not 
found." — Brinton. 

The verb often includes within itself meanings which 
in English would be expressed by adverbs or adverbial 
phrases or clauses. Adjectives, adverbs, prepositions and 
nouns are often made to serve the purpose of intransitive 
verbs. "Equally foreign to primitive speech was any 
expression of time in connection with verbal forms; in 
other words, there was no such thing as tenses." — Brin- 
ton. Relative time is indicated by the use of adverbs or 
time particles added to or incorporated in the verb. The 
American tongues reveal the fact that at one time in 
their history they had but one tense which served to ex- 
press action, being or state as past, present or future. 
To illustrate: I go (present) ; I go yesterday (past) ; I 
go to-morrow (future). 

There are many moods in the Indian languages. 



486 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Powell gives several and says that they "are of great 
number." Among them are trie indicative, the mood of 
simple declaration ; the dubitative, the mood of doubt ; 
the quotative, the mood of hearsay; the imperative^ the 
mood of command; the implorative, the mood of im- 
ploration ; the permissive, the mood of permission; the 
negative, the mood of negation ; the simulative, the mood 
of simultaneous action; the desiderative, the mood of 
desire; the obligative, the mood of obligation; the fre- 
quentative, the mood of repetition; the causative, the 
mood of cause, etc. 

Gender in the Indian tongues does not express a dis- 
tinction in sex, but a classification of things into animate 
and inanimate classes. "The animate may again be 
divided into male and female, but this is rarely the case." 
—Pozcell. Both classes may be subdivided into the 
standing, the sitting and the lying; or the watery, the 
mushy, the earthy, the stony, etc. 

Powell says : "In all these particulars it is seen that 
the Indian tongues belong to a very low type of organi- 
zation." 

The Hebrew language differs structurally from the 
Indian languages in the following respects : ( I ) It is 
highly inflected. (2) Its nouns are denotive. (3) It is 
rich in adjectives. (4) It has two tenses, the preterite 
and future. (5) It possesses conjunctions, a relative 
pronoun and an article. (6) Its genders do not divide 
things into animate and inanimate classes. (7) It em- 
ploys the dual but sparingly. (8) It does not form its 
plurals by reduplication. And (9) it does not possess 
frequentatives. These differences show plainly that there 
is not the remotest relationship between the Hebrew and 
the tongues of America. Professor Russell remarks: 
"As the American languages have no affinity with the 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



487 



Teutonic or Semitic stocks, it is evident that the source 
or sources from which they came far antedate the birth 
of the oldest people of which history takes cognizance. 
Man must therefore have set foot on American soil be- 
fore the sprouting of the linguistic twig which, after 
millenniums, produced the cuneiform inscriptions of an- 
cient Persia and Assyria." — North America, p. 360. 

The Egyptian differs from the Indian languages : 
(1) In being an inflected language. (2) In possessing 
denotive nouns. (3) In its great number of adjectives. 
(4) In its conjunctions, relative pronouns, prepositions 
and articles. And undoubtedly in a number of other 
respects which my lack of information prevents me giv- 
ing. 1 

THE DIVERSITY OF THE AMERICAN LANGUAGES. 

According to the Book of Mormon, the Nephites 
understood two languages, the Egyptian and the He- 
brew, and from these we are asked to believe the great 
multitude of American dialects have all come since Lehi 
left Jerusalem in 600 B. C. On the contrary, science 
shows that there are at least twelve hundred dialects in 
the two Americas, and that the American languages have 
changed slowly, because of which far more than twenty- 
five centuries must be demanded to account for the great 
diversity that exists among the tongues of the American 
tribes. 

Gallatin, at the beginning of the last century, esti- 
mated the number of American languages at one hun- 
dred. Squier increased the number to four hundred, 
while Ameghino found eight hundred in South America 
alone. Others have estimated thirteen hundred for both 
continents, six hundred of which Bancroft found north 



1 See "Egyptian Language," by Budge. 



4 8S 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



of the Isthmus of Panama. And Dellenbaugh gives a list 
of eighteen hundred stocks, sub-stocks and tribes in the 
northern continent alone, but as he mentions several 
more than once under different names, the list would 
shrink much smaller, but Bancroft's estimate is certainly 
small enough. Brinton finds 180 linguistic stocks in 
the New World, 100 of them in South America. Del- 
lenbaugh places the number in North America no lower 
than sixty-five, and says: "At least sixty-five of the 
separate stock languages are distinguished in North 
America, which appear so radically separated from each 
other that it is believed impossible that they ever should 
have sprung from the same parent, unless it may have 
been at a time so remote as to be beyond the scope of 
present investigation." — North Americans of Yesterday, 

p. 20. 

Some of the dialects of a single stock differ from one 
another as much as the German differs from the Eng- 
lish. "Even where a group of Amerinds speak related 
languages, or dialects," says Dellenbaugh, "there are, 
and were, such wide variations that the one is not under- 
stood by those speaking the other." — Ibid, p. 19. He 
informs us that within the limits of the present State of 
California alone twenty or thirty tribes would find it 
impossible to understand one another ; while, in a limited 
area in Arizona, a Calif ornian dialect would be unintel- 
ligible to four tribes. This has been a difficulty that our 
Indian missionaries have encountered, finding that the 
dialect of one tribe was unintelligible among its neigh- 
bors. 

To illustrate this, I heie give a number of common 
terms from the various Indian languages of North Amer- 
ica. In Algonkin the word for the supernatural is manito 
or oki; in Iroquois it is otkon; in Hidatsa, hopa; in 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



489 



Dakota, wakan; in Aztec, teotl; and in Maya, ku. The 
word for "man" with the Algonkin is innini; with the 
Iroquois, onwi; with the Eskimo, inuk; with the Apache, 
ailee; with the Zuni, oatse; and with the Mohave, ipah. 
With the Klamath the word for "woman" is snawats; 
with the Zuni it is ocare ; with the Shoshone, wepee ; with 
the Choctaw, ohoyo ; and with the Creek, hokti. The 
word for "fire" with the Apache is kon; with the Choc- 
taw, luak; with the Creek, tittka; with the Mohawk, 
otsira; and with the Algonkin, scota. "Water," with the 
Apache, is to ah; with the Klamath, ampo ; with the Aztec, 
atl; with the Choctaw, oka; with the Cherokee, awa; and 
with the Algonkin, bish or zvaboo. These comparisons 
are sufficient to give the reader some idea of the diversity 
in words that exists among the various tribes. By both 
their structure and roots the languages of the New 
World are separated from those of the Old ; by certain 
minor structural differences and by their roots, stock is 
separated from stock; and by their words, tribe from 
tribe. 

Languages change slowly. George Bancroft writes: 
"Nothing is so indelible as speech : sounds that, in ages 
of unknown antiquity, were spoken among the nations 
of Hindostan, still live in their significancy in the lan- 
guage which we daily utter." — U. S. History, Vol. III., p. 
3*3- 

Nott and Gliddon ascribe to the Chinese and Coptic 
an age of five thousand years. The Basque and Iberian 
are said to be three thousand years old, while the Welsh 
and Erse are known to possess an antiquity of two thou- 
sand years and are probably much older. 

Coming to the New World, we find tribes using 
words and grammatical constructions employed by their 
ancestors in remote antiquity. Dr. Stohl estimates that 



490 



CVMORAH REVISITED 



"the difference which is presented between the Cak- 
chiquel and Maya dialects could not have arisen in less 
than two thousand years." — Essays of an Americanist, 
p. 35. These are dialects of the same language, the 
Mayan, and if it took two thousand years to create the 
difference that exists between them how much more time 
must have been necessary to create the difference that 
exists between the Maya and the Algonkin. 

Dellenbaugh says : "Thus it seems probable that the 
Amerind languages extant have been spoken nearly as we 
know them to-day for a great many centuries, and that 
modifications crept in slowly ; so slowly that the language 
roots and grammatical construction of the various stocks 
are so distinct that they form the safest guide now avail- 
able in the classification of the various branches of the 
Amerind race; and, furthermore, that, judged by these 
tests, these languages have no relationship to any other 
group." — North Americans of Yesterday, pp. 24, 25. 

Squier writes : "It is the length of time which this 
prodigious subdivision of languages in America must 
have required, making every allowance for the greater 
changes to which unwritten languages are liable, and for 
the necessary breaking up of nations in a hunter state 
into separate communities. For these changes, Mr. Gal- 
latin claims, we must have the very longest time we are 
permitted to assume; and, if it is considered necessary to 
derive the American races from the other continent, that 
the migration must have taken place at the earliest assign- 
able period." — Types of Mankind, p. 281. 

And Russell says ; "It is a warrantable inference, 
therefore, that the marvelous diversity in speech present 
in America could only have arisen by a process of evolu- 
tion involving a very long period of time." — North Amer- 
ica, p. 360. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



491 



And yet, with this prodigious diversity of the Ameri- 
can languages and dialects, and the additional fact that 
languages change their structure and roots slowly, before 
us, we are asked to believe that all these American 
tongues originated not more than twenty-five hundred 
years ago in two languages brought over from the Old 
World to which they bear no analogies in construction 
and but few resemblances in words ! 

SUPPOSED BOOK OF MORMON WORDS IN AMERICAN 
NOMENCLATURE. 

A favorite argument against the authenticity of the 
Book of Mormon has been that none of the names of 
men, places and countries mentioned therein have come 
down to us in the nomenclature of the American tribes. 
Indeed, it seems that the orthographical principles under- 
lying the spelling of American names are not those 
underlying the spelling of the names in the Book of 
Mormon. 

From time to time, however, Mormon writers have 
tried to answer this objection by citing the names of 
individuals, cities and places in America which more or 
less closely correspond with those of the Book of Mor- 
mon, pleading time, change and apostasy as the reasons 
why more and closer correspondences are not found. On 
this point I quote from the "Manual of the Young (Mor- 
mon) Men's Mutual Improvement Associations," for 
1905- 1906, p. 543 : "One recognizes here a real difficulty, 
and one for which it is quite hard to account. It must 
be remembered, however, that from the close of the 
Nephite period, 420 A. D., to the coming of the Span- 
iards in the sixteenth century, we have a period of over 
one thousand years ; and we have the triumph also of the 
Lamanites over the Nephites bent on the destruction of 



492 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



every vestige of Nephite traditions and institutions. May 
it not be that they recognized as one of the means of 
achieving such destruction the abrogation of the old, 
familiar names of things and persons? Besides, there is 
the probable influx of other tribes and peoples into 
America in that one thousand years whose names may 
have largely taken the place of Nephite and Lamanite 
names." 

This explanation, however, is by no means satisfac- 
tory. It would require far more than one thousand years 
to blot out the names of so widespread a race as the 
Nephites, when a remnant of them escaped destruction 
at Cumorah and when many of their names were in com- 
mon use among the Lamanites. Again, many of the 
names in the Book of Mormon are Lamanite names, and 
though a people might attempt to blot out the language 
of their enemies, it is not at all likely that they would 
try to blot out their own. If the Indians are Lamanites, 
why have Lamanite names not passed down to us? 
Lastly, the supposition that foreign tribes and peoples 
may have migrated to America and may have supplanted 
Nephite and Lamanite names with those of their own 
languages, is nullified by every line of evidence which 
we have. If such influxes of immigration have occurred 
since 420 A. D., they have not been sufficient to tinge the 
stock, let alone affect the language. 

The American names which the author of the fore- 
going extract thinks have come from the Book of Mor- 
mon vocabulary are Nahuas from Nephites, Hohgates 
from Hagoth, Amazon from Ammon and Andes from 
Anti-Nephi-Lehi, Anti-Omno, Anti-Pas or Anti-Parah. 
But the resemblance between these various names is so 
slight that, without comment, I give to the writer all that 
he can prove by it. It requires the fervid imagination of 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



a visionary to see in these American names even the 
slightest suggestion of those given in the Book of Mor- 
mon. 

In the Saints' Herald of April 4, 1906, under the 
heading, "For the Wisdom of Their Wise Men Shall 
Perish" (Isa. 29:14), appears an article on Book of 
Mormon names in American nomenclature, in which the 
following list of comparisons is given: 

Book of Mormon, 1830. - Lately Found. 

Nephites, Neophites. 
Laman, Laman. 
Manti, Manti. 
Cumeni, Cuemani. 
Moroni, Morona, Maroni, Marroni. 

David, David. 
Sam, Sami. 
Mulek, Muluc. 
Moron, Moron. 

Desolation, Desaldo (the Spanish name 

for desolation). 

The writer of this article finds these supposed Book 
of Mormon names in works on geography, history and 
American ethnology. But the erroneousness of most of 
them is detected with little research, while the difficulty 
connected with the rest is that the defenders of the Book 
of Mormon are not able to prove that they are due to 
inheritance and are not accidental. Of the names in the 
first column taken from the Book of Mormon, Nephites 
is the name of a people ; Laman, the name of an indi- 
vidual, one of the sons of Lehi ; Manti, the name of a 
city in the land of Zarahemla, the present country of 
Colombia; Cumeni, also the name of a city in the land 
of Zarahemla; Moroni, the name of the Nephite who is 
said to have deposited the Book of Mormon in Hill 
Cumorah; David, a city in the land of David, the south- 
ern part of Nicaragua; Sam, a brother of Nephi; Mulek, 
one of the sons of Zedekiah and the leader of the second 
colony that came from Jerusalem ; Moron, the capital of 
the Jaredites; and Desolation, the name of a Nephite 



494 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



land comprising most of the present states of Nicaragua 
and Costa Rica. These names the author of the article 
mentioned claims he has found, some more or less cor- 
rupted, in America. 

1. On Neophites, which he gives as the equivalent of 
Xephites, he says : "See Bancroft, Native Races, Vol. 
I., p. 450, edition 1882, 'Neophites,' an Indian tribe." But 
by consulting Bancroft I find that a ludicrous blunder 
has been made. The passage which is referred to reads : 
"Tame Indians or Neophites : Lakisumne, Shonomne, 
Fawalomnes, Mukeemnes, Cosumne." If our author had 
consulted Webster he would have found that "neophites" 
is not an original Indian word at all, but is simply the 
English word "neophytes" incorrectly spelled. This word 
is not the name of an Indian tribe at all, but is a term 
meaning "new converts or proselytes." The tribes men- 
tioned are some of the Christianized tribes living near, 
or upon, the Pacific Coast. If some of our Mormon 
friends would only bound their zeal with a little judg- 
ment and practical information, they would often save 
themselves much cruel mortification over such inexcusa- 
ble blunders. 

2. On the existence of the name Laman in America 
he cites Stamford's "Compendium of Geography of Cen- 
tral and South America," Vol. II., p. 23, edition of Lon- 
don, 1 90 1 : 

"Mexican and Central American Stock Races and Languages. 
Ethnical and Historical Relations. 

Stock. Main Division. Location. 

Chontal, LAMAN, Nicaragua. 

Honduras. 
Costa Rica." 

Now. I do not deny the genuineness of the above 
reference, but the classification is certainly erroneous. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



495 



No such stock as the Chontal exists. Brinton gives this 
definition of the term: "No such family exists. The 
word chontalli in the Nahuatl language means simply 
'stranger,' and was applied by the Nahuas to any people 
other than their own." — The American Race, p. 147. 
Bancroft is of the same opinion, and says: "I am there- 
fore of the opinion that no such nations as Chontals or 
Popolucas exist, but that these names were employed by 
the more civilized nations to designate people speaking 
other and barbarous tongues." — Native Races, Vol. III., 
p. 783. The name Lamans is the name of a small tribe 
in the eastern part of Nicaragua. It is so insignificant 
that it is not even mentioned in the ethnographical lists 
of Bancroft, Brinton and Dellenbaugh. On its deriva- 
tion I am not able to speak, as I have not found more 
than its mere mention. 

3. The name Manti Mormons have found in the 
American Antiquarian, Vol. XXII., No. 2, March and 
April, 1900, p. 129, in the account of the finding of cer- 
tain archaeological remains in Ecuador. 

"Near Manti, Ecuador, is a remarkable archaeological 
relic, one of the most interesting monuments in South 
America of an unknown and extinct civilization. Upon 
a platform of massive blocks of stone, upon a summit of 
a low hill in a natural amphitheater and arranged in a 
perfect circle, are thirty enormous stone chairs, evidently 
'The Seats of the Mighty.' Each chair is a monolith, 
cut from a solid block of granite, and they are all fine 
specimens of stone carving. The seat rests upon the 
back of a crouching sphinx, which has a decidedly Egyp- 
tian appearance. There are no backs to the chairs, but 
two broad arms. This is supposed to have been a place 
of meeting — an open-air council of the chiefs of the 
several tribes that made up the prehistoric nation, which 



496 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



was subdued by the Incas of Peru several hundred years 
before the Spanish invasion." 

I carefully looked through several directories and 
gazetteers, besides Rand-McNally's "Indexed Pocket 
Map of Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia," for this place, but 
to no avail. The nearest that I was able to come to it 
was in Manta, the name of a city in Ecuador in the 
province of Manabi on the Pacific Coast. I then wrote 
to Rev. S. D. Peet, editor of the American Antiquarian, 
asking him if it were not possible that in the above 
description a mistake had been made, and that it should 
read Manta in place of Manti. To this letter of inquiry 
I received the following reply, dated at Chicago, Feb- 
ruary 22, 1908: 

"In reply to yours of the nth inst., in regard to the 
name 'Manti,' or 'Manta,' occurring in my American 
Antiquarian, Vol. XXII., No. 2, p. 129, let me say that 
the word must have been misspelt, and it should have 
been 'Manta.' Truly, there is no 'Manti' in Ecuador, and 
'Manta' is correct." 

This settles the matter, then, of the spelling of the 
name of this place. But Manta is not an original Amer- 
ican name at all, but is of Spanish derivation, meaning, 
according to the "Century Dictionary," an enormous 
devil-fish or sea-devil, an eagle-ray of the family Cera- 
topteridoe. Brinton also mentions a tribe of Indians 
called Mantas who lived in this locality. 1 

4. The next Book of Mormon name which this writer 
claims he has found in a corrupted state in America 
is Cuemani for Cumeni. He says : "See Rand, McNally 
& Co.'s Index Atlas of the World, revised edition, 
page 351, map of Colombia, 'M. 10/ Near the equator 



1 "The American Race," p. 207. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



497 



you will find the city of Cuemani. Compare with our 
Archaeological Committee's Report on the Book of Mor- 
mon, map of the Land of Zarahemla, Map No. 14, and 
you will find that Rand, McNally & Co. find Cuemani 
just where Book of Mormon map locates Cumeni." 

I have not been able to find a city by the name of 
Cuemani on the Rand-McNally map of Columbia, but I 
have found the Cuemani River at "M. 10." This is not, 
however, "just where the Book of Mormon map locates 
Cumeni," but about three hundred miles to the southeast 
of where that city is located. On the derivation of this 
name I am not certain, but I am strongly of the opinion 
that it is a Spanish- American term and that it is pro- 
nounced either Koo-a-man-<?<? or Koo-a-man-ee, c before 
u, in Spanish, having the sound of k, u the sound of 00, 
e the sound of long a, a the sound of a in father, and i 
the sound of long e. 

5. Our author finds Moroni in America under the 
various spellings of Maroni, Marroni and Morona. Ma- 
roni is the name of a river which divides French and 
Dutch Guiana and is pronounced Ma-ro-w^^. Marroni 
is the name of a people, pronunciation unknown. Ma- 
rona is the name of a river in Ecuador and is pro- 
nounced like Moroni, but this does not signify that it is 
a corrupted Nephite word. In fact, I am of the opinion 
that this word, too, comes from the Romance languages. 

6. On the location of a supposed modern city of 
David our author says : "See Columbian Atlas of the 
World, map of South America. In the northern ex- 
tremity of Colombia (Central America) you will find 
the city of David. Compare this with Book of Mormon 
Map No. 5. Location is remarkably close." 

As no such city is given on the Rand-McNally map 
of Colombia, and as it is not mentioned in their list of 



498 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Colombian towns and cities, I very much doubt if such 
a city exists, but if it does there is absolutely no doubt 
that its name dates from this side of the beginning of the 
Spanish occupation of that region. 

7. The Book of Mormon name Sam he discovers in 
the "Nineteenth Report of the Bureau of American Eth- 
nology," Part II., pp. 605, 625 and 628, in the form 
Sami. He says : "Professor Thomas, of the United 
States Bureau of Ethnology, tells us this name was 
found among an ancient tribe, one who preserved their 
language and customs from contamination with foreign 
tribes or people." 

I have followed up his references and find that Sami 
is the name of an individual in the Tenya clan, and also 
in the Antelope Society at Walpi, Arizona. But how 
does he know that this name is a corruption of Sam? 
He is welcome to all that it proves for the historical 
credibility of the Book of Mormon. 

8. Muluc, which he thinks is a corruption of Mulek, 
the leader of the Mulekites, he finds in the nomenclature 
of the calendar system of Central America. Other Mor- 
mon writers have pointed out the similarity of these 
words before. Apostle Kelley writes : "There is some- 
thing of marked significance in a statement found on 
page 425 of 'North Americans of Antiquity,' in regard 
to the word 'Mulek.' The 'Book of Mormon' affirms 
that at the time the Jews were taken captive to Babylon, 
'Mulek/ one of the sons of Zedekiah, came over, with 
others, to this continent, and settled in Central America ; 
and in the account above referred to the statement is 
made that, 'By means of Landa's key. Mr. Bollaert trans- 
lated some of the hieroglyphics found in Yucatan, and 
the word 'Mulek 5 or 'Muluc/ as written by Short, was 
deciphered, and was found to mean 'to unite,' 'reunion.' 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



499 



Considering that historical statement in the 'Book of 
Mormon,' that there was a union formed, or federation 
between the Nephites and Mulekites in Central America, 
in primeval times, and it goes far to prove that there 
was something more than fancy and guesswork, the 
emanations from the brains of mere men, that inspired 
the revelation of the 'Book of Mormon.' " — Presidency 
and Priesthood, p. 288. 

But, in the first place, it is only a gratuitous assump- 
tion that Muluc is a corrupted form of Mulek. In the 
second, the words are only similar and not identical in 
either spelling or pronunciation. In the third place, Muluc 
is the name of one of the twenty days in the Maya calen- 
dar and not the name of a personage in their mythology. 
In the fourth, the Book of Mormon character, Mulek, 
was dead and buried over three hundred years before the 
people of Zarahemla and the Nephites united, therefore 
Muluc, which means "to unite" or "reunion," if it is a 
corruption of Mulek, could not have derived its signifi- 
cance from that event. In the fifth, the word Muluc is 
found in the language of a people who lived over eight 
hundred miles from the region where the union between 
the Nephites and Zarahemlaites is said to have taken 
place, and whose language, traditions and architecture 
show that they came from the opposite direction. And, 
lastly, the root of this word, mol or mid, is not Hebrew, 
but is pure Maya, meaning "a coming together, or piling 
up."' 

9. The name Moron the discoverer of these compari- 
sons finds in South America. He says : "See Bradley's 
Atlas of the World, edition 1895, Argentine Republic, 
% 19,' Moron!' But this name is pure Spanish and is 



1 "Mayan Primer," p. ixj. 



5oo 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



the name of a city in Spain. As the population of the 
Argentine Republic are chiefly of Spanish descent, it is 
very probable that they named this city after that in 
their fatherland. It is pronounced Mo-rown. 

The last comparison I omit, as it is wholly absurd 
and only shows to what extremes some men will go in 
order to prove a false theory. 

If the names of the Book of Mormon prove anything, 
they prove that it is a base imposture, unworthy of our 
respect and belief, for a large proportion of them were 
known to the world long before the book appeared. Not 
a few of the names of men and of places mentioned in 
the book have been taken from the Old and New Testa- 
ments. Of the 360-odd names given in the Josephite 
"Book of Mormon Vocabulary," I counted over one hun- 
dred which appear in our Bible, while many more are but 
variations of these. Mormons explain the occurrence of 
these Bible names by the claim that the Nephites were 
Jews and had the greater part of the Old Testament 
Scriptures, hence that it would be only natural that they 
should use Bible names. This explanation may appear 
plausible, but how can they account for the occurrence 
of the Greek, Latin, Italian, Spanish and Yankee names 
which appear? Did the Jaredites and Nephites under- 
stand these languages also? Moron, the name of a 
Jaredite city and country, is the name of a city in Spain. 
Nephi, the name of the leader of the Nephites, is Greek, 
from nephei, third person, singular number of nepho, "to 
be sober." Sam, the name of the brother of Nephi, is 
the Yankee nickname for Samuel. Alma, the name of 
one of the Nephite judges, is the Latin word for "be- 
nign." Antipas is an abbreviation of Antipater. Angola 
is the name of a region in Africa. Moroni, the name of 
the last of the Nephites of royal blood, is the name of an 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



5oi 



Italian painter, Giovanni Battista Moroni, who was born 
in 1525 and died in 1578. While even the word Mor- 
mon, although Mormons deny it, is undoubtedly a cor- 
ruption of the Greek mormo, which means "a bugbear, a 
monster used by nurses to frighten children." 

Joseph Smith, however, in denying this, gives the 
following explanation of its origin: "We say from the 
Saxon, good; the Dane, god; the Goth, goda; the Ger- 
man, gut; the Dutch, goed; the Latin, bonus; the Greek, 
kalos; the Hebrew, fob; and the Egyptian, mon. Hence, 
with the addition of 'more,' or the contraction mor, we 
have the word Mormon, which means, literally, more 
good." 

But stop for a moment and consider the ridiculous- 
ness of this claim. "More" is good Anglo-Saxon; mon, 
I presume, is Reformed Egyptian, for it is certainly not 
Egyptian, the word for good in which is nefer. 1 But 
how could the Nephites obtain the first syllable of this 
interesting hybrid, being wholly ignorant of the exist- 
ence of such a people as the Anglo-Saxons and being 
separated from them by miles of water? Here is an- 
other problem for Mormon ingenuity to solve. 



"Egyptian Language," p. 113. "Essays of an Americanist," p. 216. 



502 



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CHAPTER X. 

The Hieroglyphics of America — The "Caractors" — Mormon 
"Collateral Evidence" Frauds — Conclusion. 

Probably no invention that man has made has been 
as useful to him as has the alphabet. It has proved as 
essential to his progress in civilization as the air he 
breathes is to the life of his body. Without it his wide- 
spread business and political relations would be im- 
possible, and he would be as ignorant of the achieve- 
ments of the past as the brute is of his origin. 

But the alphabet, as we have it to-day, is not the 
sudden invention of a moment, but is the growth of 
centuries, developing through various stages from the 
picture-writing of our savage ancestors. The stages 
through which the art of writing has passed may, for 
convenience, be stated as the representative, the symbolic 
and the phonetic, though, as there are no hard and fast 
lines between these successive stages, this classification 
may be considered somewhat arbitrary. 

Bancroft describes and illustrates these various stages 
of writing as follows: "Picture-writing may be divided, 
according to the successive stages of its development, 
info three classes, representative, symbolic and phonetic, 
no one of which except the last in its highest or alpha- 
betic, and the first in its rudest, state, would be used 
alone by any people, but rather all would be employed 
together. In the representative stage a jj might ex- 
press a human hand, or, as the system is perfected, a 
large, small, closed, black or red hand; and finally 'Big 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



503 



Hand/ an Indian chief; and all this would be equally in- 
telligible to American or Asiatic, savage or civilized, 
without respect to language. 

"Symbolic picture-writing indicates invisible or ab- 
stract objects, actions or conditions, by the use of pictures 
supposed to be suggestive of them ; the symbols are 
originally in a manner representative, and rarely, if 
ever, arbitrarily adopted. As a symbol the & might 
express power, a blow, murder, the number one or five. 
These symbols are also independent of language. 

"Phonetic picture-writing represents not objects, but 
sounds by the picture of objects in whose names the 
sound occurs ; first words, then syllables, then elementary 
sounds, and last — by modification of the pictures or the 
substitution of simpler ones — letters and an alphabet. 
According to this system, the signifies successively 

the word 'hand/ the syllable 'hand' in handsome, the 
sound 'ha' in happy, the aspiration 'h' in head, and 
finally, by simplifying its form or writing it rapidly, the 
k becomes | , and then the 'h' of the alphabet." — 
Native Races, Vol. II. , pp. 536, 537. 

By "the record of America's great and glorious past," 
the Book of Mormon, we are informed that the ancient 
Americans employed phonetic systems of writing. Their 
official written language, which they were pleased to 
call the "Reformed Egyptian," possessed, so we are 
told, an alphabet which was made up of characters either 
identical with, or resembling, the characters in the writ- 
ten languages of the Egyptians, Chaldeans, Assyrians, 
Greeks, Hebrews and Romans. 

I deem it best to let the Mormons themselves state 
their own position on the origin of their Reformed 
Egyptian alphabet. Apostle Kelley, president of the 
Quorum of Twelve Apostles, and a standard authority" 



504 



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in the Josephite Church, writes : "These evidences all 
unite, and confirm the truth of the claims of the 'Book 
of Mormon,' that it answers to the prediction found in 
the twenty-ninth chapter of Isaiah concerning the 
'Sealed Book,' and that it came forth in fulfillment 
thereof ; that it is a true record of the ancient inhabitants 
of America ; and that they did occupy this land in pre- 
historic times, and were an intelligent, God-fearing and 
accomplished race of people ; that they understood the 
arts and sciences, and had a regular and well-defined 
system of writing; that their alphabet was derived from 
the old original alphabet, from which all the alphabets 
of modern Europe were derived, and was composed of 
characters identical with and resembling the Egyptian, 
Chaldaic, Assyrian, Greek, Hebrew and Roman letters, 
with symbols, circles and pictorial emblems." — Presi- 
dency and Priesthood, pp. 291, 292. 

There are two assertions made in this extract which 
it will be well for the reader to keep in mind : First, that 
the characters of the written language of ancient Amer- 
ica were alphabetic; and, secondly, that they were of 
exotic origin, being identical with characters in the writ- 
ten languages of the Egyptians, Assyrians, Chaldeans, 
Greeks, Hebrews and Romans. How a Brinton or a 
Thomas would smile were they to read the wise con- 
clusions of Apostle Kelley! 

The evidences by which Mr. Kelley 's claims must be 
tested are from two sources : the evidences from the 
monuments and the evidences from the manuscripts. 
And these will confine our investigations entirely to Cen- 
tral America and Mexico, there being no proof, what- 
ever, that any tribe south of the Isthmus of Panama 
or north o*f the northern boundary line of Mexico em- 
ployed marks to represent sounds, the hieroglyphics in 



CVMORAH REVISITED 



505 



use outside of this territory being- purely ideographic in 
character. 

In Central America and Mexico the ancient inhab- 
itants painted or engraved their characters on several 




FIGURE 14. MEXICAN PICTOGRAPHS, PAGE 43, BORGIAN CODEX. 
Permission U. S. Bureau Ethnology. 



materials, such as stone, wood, pottery, plaster, cotton 
cloth, skins and a kind of paper made from the maguey 
plant. The monuments on which they engraved their 
hieroglyphics were chiefly buildings, altars and obelisks 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



and the work among the Mayas was evidently done with 
chay-stone points, while among the Mexicans the engrav- 
ing implements were sometimes of bronze. The manu- 
scripts of the former were made of native paper cut into 
strips ten inches wide and of any desired length, which 
were folded in the manner of a screen and were en- 
closed between boards, painted and ornamented with 
various designs. The paper was coated with a white 
wax on which were painted, on both sides, the hiero- 
glyphics in such colors as brown, red, yellow, blue and 
black. The manuscripts of the latter were made of cot- 
ton cloth, prepared skins or maguey paper, chiefly the 
latter, and were usually made as the Mayas made their 
books. The Maya manuscripts which have come down 
to us are four in number: the Codices Troanus and 
Cortesianus, probably parts of the same book, which are 
now in Madrid ; the Codex Peresianus, which is in Paris ; 
and the Codex Dresdensis, which is in Dresden. Un- 
fortunately for the cause of science, many of the most 
valuable of the Mexican manuscripts were destroyed 
by the fanatical Bishop Zumarraga soon after the Con- 
quest, and but few escaped. These are the Codices 
Mendoza, Vaticanus, Telleriano-Remensis, Borgianus, 
Bologna and some others of less importance. The 
Quiches had a sacred book, the "Popul Vuh," as did also 
the Cakchiquels, which was called the "Records of Tec- 
pan Atitlan." 

The hieroglyphics of the Mexicans are very different 
from those of the Mayas, being of a lower grade, and, 
evidently, of not so great an antiquity. "The graphic 
system of the Mayas of Yucatan," says Brinton, "was 
very different from that of the Aztecs. No one at all 
familiar with the two could fail at once to distinguish 
between the manuscripts of the two nations. They 



CUMORAJI REVISITED 



507 



are plainly independent developments." — Essays of an 
Americanist, p. 232. The Mexican writing is highly 
pictographic, w'hile that of the Mayas is .to a large de- 
gree phonetic, therefore, if it can be proved that the 
writing of the latter is not Reformed Egyptian, the 
claim of the Mormons falls to the ground, for there is 
no other system in America which had reached so high 
a degree of development. 

The Maya characters are grouped together in groups, 
each of which is called a "glyph," or, by the French 
writers, a "katun." As the glyphs often have rounded 
outlines, and slightly resemble the cross-section of a 
pebble, this style o-f writing is called "calculiform 
writing," from the Latin calculus, a pebble. The glyphs 
are arranged either in rows or in columns and the 
direction in which they are to be read has long been an 
unsettled question. Pro-fessor Thomas, in speaking of 
a part of the inscription on one of the tablets from the 
Temple of the Cross at Palenque, says, however: "Not- 
withstanding the fact that but few of the characters 
have been determined, the direction in which the in- 
scription is to be read is known. It begins with the 
large symbol in the upper left-hand corner of the left 
slab. This covers the space of four symbols of the ordi- 
nary size. Each of the following seven, reading down- 
ward, covers two spaces, the whole teing counted as two 
columns. The third and fourth columns, in which the 
characters are separate, are read from left to right, two 
and two, or by pairs, from the top downward, and the 
fifth and sixth columns follow in the same order." — 
American Archaeology, pp. 246, 247. 

For a long time it was thought that a translation of 
the characters on the monuments and in the manuscripts 
of Yucatan and Chiapas might throw some light on the 



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ancient history of the Mayas, but this fond hope will 
now have to be relinquished. "We need not search for 
the facts of history, the names of mighty kings, or the 
dates of conquests," says Brinton; "we shall not find 
them. Chronometry we shall find, but not chronicles ; 
astronomy with astrological aims ; rituals, but no records. 
Pre-Columbian history will not be reconstructed from 
them. This will be a disappointment to many ; but it 
is the conclusion toward -which tend all the soundest in- 
vestigations of recent years." — Mayan Primer, p. 28. 

THE AMERICAN HIEROGLYPHICS. 

(1) Did the Ancient Americans Employ a Uniform 
System of Phonetic Writing f 

According to the Book of Mormon, the Reformed 
Egyptian was invented by Nephi I., and was employed 
in both Americas. The period of time in which it was 
in use was about one thousand years, and the countries 
inhabited by those who employed it were Peru, Ecuador, 
Colombia, Central America, Mexico and the United 
States. But archaeological research discloses that the 
ancient American tribes were not uniform in their man- 
ner of writing and that only those who inhabited Central 
and Southern Mexico, Yucatan and Guatemala had 
progressed far enough in the art to employ marks to 
represent sounds, the writing of the tribes south of the 
Isthmus of Panama and north of the northern boundary 
line of Mexico being purely ideographic in character. 

On the absence of phonetic writing in Peru, Ban- 
croft says : "The more ancient nations have left nothing 
to compare with the hieroglyphic tablets of Central 
America, and the evidence is far from satisfactory that 
they possessed any advanced art in writing." — Native 
Races, Vol. IV., p. 792. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



509 



And, in speaking of the same people, Squier writes: 
"Fortunately for our knowledge of the people of the 
past ages, who never attained to a written language, 
they were accustomed to bury with their dead the things 
they most regarded in life, and from this we may deduce 
something of their modes of living, and gain some idea 
of their religious notions and beliefs." — Peru, p. 73. 

Though a few of the Peruvian tribes used picto- 
graphs to some extent, the ordinary, and almost uni- 
versal, way of carrying on communications among them 
was by the quipu. This instrument was a cord about 
two feet long from which small threads were suspended 
in the form of a fringe. The cord and the threads were 
dyed different colors and were tied into different knots 
by which different ideas were conveyed. The color white 
represented silver ; the color yellow, gold ; or white signi- 
fied peace, and red, war. Notwithstanding the quipu 
sufficed for several practical purposes, when the subject 
of the communication was known, it was inadequate in 
the transmission of historical knowledge to succeeding 
generations. 

On the absence of phonetic writing north of Mexico 
we have the following : 

"None of the tribes north of Mexico had made the 
discovery that marks can represent sounds." — Dellen- 
haugh, p. 39. 

"Nothing as yet justifies us in supposing that the 
Mound Builders were sufficiently advanced in civiliza- 
tion to have an alphabet." — Nadaillac, p. 166, Footnote. 

"American archaeologists have been more or less in- 
terested in the question whether or not the Mound Build- 
ers had a written language. All the evidence is against 
the supposition." — MacLean, p. 90. 

"They" — the Mound Builders — "had seemingly made 



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FIGURE 15. [NDIAN P1CTOGRAPHS. 
Permission U. S. Bureau Ethnology. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



5ii 



no approach to the higher grades of hieroglyphic writ- 
ing." — Bancroft, Vol. IV., p. 786. 

"No well authenticated mound-builder hieroglyphics 
have as yet come to light." — Short, p. 419. 

"He" — the Ohio Mound Builder — "failed to grasp 
the idea of communication by written characters." — 
Moorehead, p. 200. 

By these statements the reader will see that the 
claim of the Book of Mormon, that the ancient Ameri- 
cans employed a uniform phonetic system of writing 
throughout both North and South America, is not true. 

(2) The Character of American Hieroglyphics — Are 
They Alphabetic? 

The assertion of Mr. Kelley, that the ancient Amer- 
icans employed an alphabet, now demands our attention. 
That the ancient Central Americans and Mexicans had 
developed their graphic systems so far as to use char- 
acters to represent sounds many of the best students of 
American archaeology believe, but that they had ad- 
vanced so far as to use alphabets like the Egyptian, 
Greek, Hebrew and Roman alphabets, is not sustained 
by a single fact which has been brought to light. 

All that can be said for the phonetic element in the 
Mexican system of writing is comprised in this extract 
from Brinton : "As I have observed, the native genius 
had not arrived at a complete analysis of the phonetic 
elements of the language ; but it was distinctly progress- 
ing in that direction. Of the five vowels and fourteen 
consonants which make up the Nahuatl alphabet, three 
vowels certainly, and probably three consonants, had 
reached the stage where they were often expressed as 
simple letters by the method above described. The 
vowels were a, for which the sign was ail, water ; e 
represented by a bean, etl; and 0 by a footprint, or 



512 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



path, otli; the consonants were p, represented either by 
a flag, pan, or a mat, petl; t, by a stone, tetl, or the lips, 
tentli; and £, by a lancet, £0. These are, however, ex- 
ceptions. Most of the Nahuatl phonetics were syllabic, 
sometimes one, sometimes two syllables of the name of 
the object being employed. When the whole name of an 
object or most of it was used as a phonetic value, the 
script remains truly phonetic, but becomes of the nature 
of a rebus, and this is the character of most of the pho- 
netic Mexican writing." — Essays of an Americanist, pp. 
206, 207. 

But the fact that the Mexicans employed signs for 
the sounds of a, e, o and possibly for p, t and z does not 
necessarily prove that these signs were alphabetic, for 
the sounds a, e, o, p, t and z are sometimes syllabic 
sounds, as in a-sleep, e-lope, o-bey, pe-culiar, te-nacious 
and ze-bra. It is a significant fact that the lancet, said 
to be the sign for z, stands for the syllable zo in the 
name Mo-quah-zo-ma, Montezuma. But be this as it 
may, as the Mexican phonetics are mingled with symbols 
and ideograms which far exceed them in number, it can 
be stated without reserve that they had not progressed 
far beyond the ideographic stage. And this refutes 
Apostle Kelley's absurd claim that the ancient inhab- 
itants of Mexico, and the rest of the New World, de- 
rived their alphabet "from the old original alphabet, 
from which all the alphabets of modern Europe were 
derived." 

The writing of the Mayas, though further advanced 
than that of the Mexicans, had not reached the alpha- 
betic stage. Those who have made it a special study 
may be divided into three classes : First, those who main- 
tain that it is wholly or mainly ideographic ; secondly, 
those who consider it chiefly phonetic ; and, thirdly, those 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



513 



who regard it as mainly ideographic, but who think that 
it is occasionally phonetic. To the first class belong the 
German writers, Forstemann, Schellhas and Seler; to 
the second, the French writers, De Bourbourg, De Rosny 
and De Charency, with such American investigators as 
Thomas, Cresson and Le Plongeon ; and to the third that 
able Americanist, Dr. D. G. Brinton. 

Though a number of alphabets have been constructed 
by different students of this language, none of them have 
proved to be of much value to modern investigators. 
Landa's was the first and was constructed in 1570. In 
1883 his alphabet was extended by De Bourbourg and 
De Rosny, who defined twenty-nine letters, with numer- 
ous variants, from the Codices and the inscriptions. In 
1885 Dr. Le Plongeon published his "Ancient Maya Hier- 
atic Alphabet According to Mural Inscriptions/' which 
contains twenty-three letters with variants. Dr. H. T. 
Cresson also attempted to reduce the Maya hieroglyphics 
to an alphabet. "His theory," says Brinton, "was that 
the glyphs stood for the names of pictures worn down 
to a single phonetic element, alphabetic or syllabic. This 
element he conceived was consonantal, to be read with 
any vowel, either prefixed or suffixed ; and the consonant 
was permutable with any of its class, as a lingual, palatal, 
etc." — Mayan Primer, p. 15. Besides these, De la Roche- 
foucauld's alphabet of twenty-seven letters appeared in 
1888 and that of Thomas, with twenty characters, in 
1893. Brinton pronounces the former fanciful and says 
of the latter: "Aside from the doubtful character of 
many of his analyses, the fact that this 'key' has wholly 
failed to add any tangible, valuable addition to our 
knowledge of the inscriptions is enough to show its 
uselessness ; and the same may be said of all the attempts 
mentioned," — Ibid, p. 17. 



514 



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Latter-day Saints are especially interested in Le Plon- 
geon's ''Ancient Maya Hieratic Alphabet," because many 
of its characters are plainly identical with characters in 
the alphabet of the Egyptians, and publish it side by side 
with the Egyptian alphabet in the Appendix to their 
"Report of the Committee on American Archaeology." 
They believe that this alphabet settles the question that 
the ancient Americans employed the Reformed Egyptian 
writing as the Book of Mormon declares. In an article, 
"Book of Mormon Characters," published first in Zions 
Ensign, and afterwards in the Evening and Morning 
Star, of Independence, Missouri, for February, 1907, 
the writer, Mr. Fred B. Farr, says : "There is much to 
substantiate the belief that this Reformed Egyptian with 
which the plates were inscribed was of a phonetic char- 
acter, or like shorthand. The hieratic writings of the 
Egyptians was of this nature, and we are informed by 
Professor Le Plongeon and others that the writings of 
the ancient people of this country bear a strong re- 
semblance to that class." 

Now I frankly concede that if Dr. Le Plongeon's 
alphabet is the key which unlocks the mysteries of Palen- 
que and Chichen Itza, the conclusion that the ancient 
Mayas employed the Egyptian alphabet logically follows, 
for the two alphabets, as they appear in the "Report of 
the Committee on American Archaeology," are identical 
in most of their signs. But has research corroborated 
Le Plongeon and established the correctness of his alpha- 
bet as Mormons try to make their readers believe? It 
most emphatically has not. Le Plongeon's alphabet was 
first published in the supplement to the Scientific Ameri- 
can of January, 1885, and afterwards, I believe, in his 
"Sacred Mysteries of the Mayas." Yet, notwithstanding 
it has been before the scholarship of the world for twen- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



515 



ty-three years, the hieroglyphical sphinx has not yet 
spoken and our Americanists are still at work trying 
to solve the riddle of the past. 1 But Mormons are will- 
fully blind to this significant fact. 

Rejecting, as most students have done, the theory 
that the Maya writing is alphabetic, we adopt the theory 
that the phonetic elements which it contains are purely 
syllabic and that these are used in connection with sym- 
bols and ideographs which in no way stand for the sound 
of the name of the thing they are intended to represent. 

Of the character of the Maya writing, Brinton 
speaks as follows : "We do not find a developed pho- 
netic system, and yet one more than pictographic. The 
figures are combinations of symbols, ideograms and 
phonetic equivalents, the last mentioned being in suffi- 
ciently large proportion to render some knowledge of 
the Maya language necessary to an interpretation of the 
records." — Myths of the New World, p. 26. 

Dr. Schellhas gives this as his decision on the char- 
acter of the Maya hieroglyphs: "The Maya writing is 
ideographic in principle, and probably avails itself, in 
order to complete its ideographic hieroglyphs, of a num- 
ber of fixed phonetic signs." — Essays of an Americanist, 
p. 200. 

And Prof. Cyrus Thomas says: "As frequent allusion 
is made herein to the phoneticism or phonetic value of 

1 So far has Le Plongeon's "Maya Hieratic Alphabet" dropped out of 
sight that, although I placed an order with two of the largest publishing- 
houses in the country, I was not able to obtain a copy, either new or 
second-hand, of his "Sacred Mysteries," in which it is explained. One 
of these publishing-houses informed me that while it was out of print, a 
second-hand copy might be picked up for $18 or $20. In reply I authorized 
them to get me a copy, if possible. Later they wrote that although they 
had made the effort a copy could not be found. The other publishing- 
house simply notified me that the book was out of print and not obtainable. 
If this alphabet is the key that unlocks the mysteries of the Maya hiero- 
glyphics, why has it dropped so quickly and completely out of sight? 



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the written characters or hieroglyphs, it is proper that 
the writer's position on this point should be clearly under- 
stood. He does not claim that the Maya scribes had 
reached that advanced stage where they could indicate 
each letter-sou»nd by a glyph or symbol. On the con- 
trary, he thinks a symbol, probably derived in most cases 
from an older method of picture-writing, was selected 
because the name or word it represented had as its chief 
phonetic element a certain consonant sound or syllable. 
If this consonant element were b, the symbol would be 
used where b was the prominent consonant element of the 
word to be indicated, no reference, however, to its orig- 
inal signification being necessarily retained. Thus the 
symbol for cab, ' 'earth/ might be used in writing Caban, 
a day name, or cabil, 'honey,' because cab is their chief 
phonetic element. 

"In a previous work I have expressed the opinion that 
the characters are to a certain extent phonetic — are not 
true alphabetic signs, but syllabic. And at the same 
time I expressed the opinion that even this definition did 
not hold true of all, as some were apparently ideo- 
graphic, while others were simply abbreviated pictorial 
representations." — Sixteenth Report of the Bureau of 
American Ethnology, p. 205. 

The syllabic signs in the Mexican and Mayan writing 
differ, however, in an important respect from the syllabic 
signs on the bricks and tablets of Assyria. In the written 
language of the Assyrians the syllabic signs had lost 
their pictorial character and were written with wedges 
arranged in various ways ; in the written languages of 
the Mexicans and Mayas the syllabic signs still retained 
their pictorial character, being the pictures of things the 
sounds of whose names, or of certain syllables of whose 
names, when put together, made the sound of the word 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



517 



represented. A simple illustration of this principle is 
found in the name of the Aztec king, Montezuma. This 
name is written with a mouse-trap and an eagle's head 
transfixed with a lancet and surmounted with a human 
hand. In the Nahuatl language the word for mouse-trap 
is montli, from which we have the syllable mon or mo; the 
word for eagle is quauhtli, from which we have quauh; 
the word for lancet is zo, from which we have the syllable 
zo; and the word for hand is maitl, from which we have 
ma. Putting these syllables, each of which is repre- 
sented by a pictograph, together and we have Mo-quauh- 
zo-ma, the name of the Mexican chief. This principle 
is further illustrated by the device which the English 
gallant had embroidered on his gow.n with which to show 
his devotion to the lady of his heart, Rose Hill. It con- 
sisted of the pictures of a rose, a hill, an eye, a loaf of 
bread and a well, which being interpreted is, "Rose Hill 
I love well." Another illustration of this principle is 
in the word "chairman," which in rebus-writing of our 
day would be written with pictures of a chair and a man. 

To this kind of ancient American writing Brintor 
gives the name of ikonomatic writing, from the Greek 
eikon, a figure or image, and onoma, a name. This is 
the highest stage that any system in America reached, 
and Apostle Kelley's claim, made without any prooi 
whatever, that the ancient Americans employed an al- 
phabet, falls to the ground. In all of their phonetic 
writing they wrote with syllables, not with letters, while 
the greater part of their signs were pure ideographs 
having no phonetic value whatever. 

(3) The Origin of American Hieroglyphics — Are 
They of Exotic Origin? 

Apostle Kelley asserts that the ancient Americans 
had an alphabet, not only, but also that this alphabet was 



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CUMORAH REVISITED 



"composed of characters identical with and resembling 
the Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian, Greek, Hebrew and 
Roman letters, with symbols, circles and pictorial em- 
blems." And Apostle J. R. Lambert, of the same church, 
in his "Objections to the Book of Mormon and Book of 
Doctrine and Covenants Answered and Refuted," p. 71, 
says: "Since it is now admitted that the aborigines used 
Egyptian, we are under no obligations to prove it ; and 
as the Book of Mormon claims to be a history of the 
aborigines of America, we thus establish harmony be- 
tween the claims of the book and the facts in the case, 
and it remains for our opponents to prove that whoever 
wrote the historical part of the Book of Mormon learned 
all that he knew about the use of Reformed Egyptian 
from the antiquarian discoveries which had been made 
before the Book of Mormon was written." 

I can not refrain from saying that these gentlemen, 
if they had given the subject of American writing the 
study which it deserves, stated what they positively knew 
was not true. The ancient Americans did not use char- 
acters identical with Egyptian, Chaldean, Assyrian, 
Greek, Hebrew and Roman characters, neither is it con- 
ceded that they used Reformed Egyptian or any other 
kind of Egyptian, the theories of the Mormon witnesses, 
Delafield and Le Plongeon, being disproved by both time 
and research. The key that has unlocked the mysteries 
of ancient Egypt does not fit the lock which holds the 
door to the secrets of ancient America. If the ancient 
Americans employed letters from the alphabets of the 
Old World, why have they not been found engraved on 
their monuments and inscribed in their manuscripts? 
Why have their monuments not been made to speak by 
the Egyptologist and Assyriologist ? There is but one 
answer to these questions, and that is that the written 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



519 



languages of America possess a character peculiar to 
themselves, and that they were not derived from the 
languages of the Old World. In opposition to the ab- 
surd claims of Messrs. Kelley and Lambert, let me place 
the statements of men who are authorities in this branch 
of American archaeology. 

"The American hieroglyphics contain no element to 
prove their foreign origin, and there is no reason to look 
upon them as other than the result of original native de- 
velopment." — Bancroft, Vol. II., p. 551. 

"Notwithstanding the oft-repeated assertion that a 
resemblance between Egyptian and Maya hieroglyphics 
exists, no one of the Egyptologists so successful in their 
chosen field has been able to decipher the Maya writing." 
— Short, p. 418. 

"So far as now understood, there is no relationship 
between any kind of Amerindian writing and that of 
other races. Like everything else pertaining to the 
Amerind people, the development appears to have been 
purely indigenous." — Dellenbangh, p. 80. 

The Mayas attributed the invention of their writing 
to Zamna and to a time after they had become settled 
in Central America. "It is to Zamna that the Yucatecs 
ascribed all their progress ; tradition attributes to him 
the invention of hieroglyphic writing, and he was the 
first to teach the people to give a name to men and to 
things." — Prehistoric America, p. 348. 

And Thomas thinks that the Mayan system was de- 
veloped out of a primitive system of picture-writing. 
He says : "The more I study these characters the 
stronger becomes the conviction that they have grown 
out of a pictographic system similar to that common 
among the Indians of North America." — Discovery of 
America, by Fiske, Vol. I., p. 132, Footnote. 



520 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



(4) The Age of the American Hieroglyphics. 

On the age of the hieroglyphical systems of the Mex- 
icans and Mayas but little can be said. There are a few 
facts, however, which help us to arrive at a conclusion as 
to the approximate time in which these nations began 
their use. I think that I am safe in saying that there is 
nothing to warrant the opinion that they antedate the 
first century of our era, nor that they were invented by 
a 'vanished race" which preceded the advent of the 
Mexican and Central American tribes, for but few archae- 
ologists will any longer claim for the ancient cities of 
these countries a greater antiquity than nineteen hundred 
years and "vanished races" no longer hover on the 
horizon of pre-Columbian history. 

The Maya writing was certainly invented after the 
migration of that people from the north, for the Huas- 
tecs, the Mayan tribe which broke off in the migration 
southward, have never practiced it and it bears no rela- 
tionship whatever to the Mexican system. This would 
seem to confine its origin and development wholly to 
Central America. And this is fully in accord with the 
tradition of the Mayas already given that Zamna was 
the inventor of their hieroglyphics. On the other hand, 
it is just as clearly established that the hieroglyphics 
were invented before the Mayas entered Yucatan, for 
they are found engraved on the monuments of Palenque 
and neighboring cities which were built before the erec- 
tion of the Yucatec cities. This evidence seems to indi- 
cate that the Mayan hieroglyphical system reached its 
highest stage after the migration from the north, but be- 
fore the settlement of Yucatan, which, I think, would 
establish its invention at sometime between 1 A. D. and 
400 A. D. 

On the antiquity of the Mayan hieroglyphics Nadail- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



521 



lac says: "The myths and traditions that have been col- 
lected may date back to a time before the Christian era, 
but the hieroglyphics are certainly not so old." — Pre- 
historic America, pp. 260, 261. 

Mexican writing, without question, is not as old as 
the Mayan. Even if we go by tradition alone we can 
not date its invention beyond the sixth century of our 
era, and the probabilities are that it is not so old. 

THE "CARACTORS." 

Joseph Smith says that in the month of February, 
1828, he copied a number of characters from the plates, 
part of which he translated, and sent them by Martin 
Harris to Prof. Charles Anthon and Dr. Samuel Mitchell, 
of New York, for their examination. The characters 
which Smith claims were not translated may be seen in 
Figure 16. 

The account of Harris as to what took place at N'ew 
York is as follows : "I went to the city of New York 
and presented the characters which had been translated, 
with the translation thereof to Professor Anthon, a 
gentleman celebrated for his literary attainments ; Pro- 
fessor Anthon stated that the translation was correct, 
more so than any he had before seen translated from the 
Egyptian. I then showed him those which were not yet 
translated, and he said that they were Egyptian, Chal- 
daic, Assyriac and Arabic, and he said that they were 
the true characters. He gave me a certificate certifying 
to the people of Palmyra that they were true characters, 
and that the translation of such of them as had been 
translated was also correct. I took the certificate and 
put it into my pocket, and was just leaving the house, 
when Mr. Anthon called me back, and asked me how 
the young man found out that there were gold plates 



522 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



in the place where he found them. I answered that an 
angel of God had revealed it unto him. 

"He then said to me, 'Let me see that certificate.' I 
accordingly took it out of my pocket and gave it to him, 
when he took it and tore it to pieces, saying that there 
was no such thing now as ministering angels, and that 
if I would bring the plates to him, he would translate 
them. I informed him that part of the plates were sealed, 
and that I was forbidden to bring them. He replied, 'I 
can not read a sealed book.' I left him and went to Dr. 



Mitchell, who sanctioned what Professor Anthon had 
said respecting both the characters and the translation." 

This account is one of the stock-in-trade arguments 
of the Mormons, who declare that the visit of Harris to 
Professor Anthon and the latter's statement that he 
could not read a sealed book are a fulfillment of Isa. 
29: 11 : "And the vision of all is become unto you as the 
words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to 
one that is learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and 
he saith, I cannot ; for it is sealed." 

But Professor Anthon gives a very different account 
of his interview with Harris, in which it does not so 




FIGURE 16. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



523 



plainly appear that his words are a fulfillment of the 
prophecy quoted. In a letter, dated at New York, Feb- 
ruary 17, 1834, in answer to an inquiry from E. D. 
Howe, Esq., of Painesville, Ohio, author of "History 
of Mormonism," he says : "The whole story about my 
having pronounced the Mormonite inscription to be 'Re- 
formed Egyptian hieroglyphics' is perfectly false. Some 
years ago, a plain, and apparently simple-hearted, farmer 
called upon me with a note from Dr. Mitchell, of our 
city, now deceased, requesting me to decipher, if pos- 
sible, a paper, which the farmer would hand me, and 
which Dr. M. confessed he had been unable to under- 
stand. Upon examining the paper in question, I soon 
came to the conclusion that it was all a trick, perhaps a 
hoax. When I asked the person, who brought it, how 
he obtained the writing, he gave me, as far as I can now 
recollect, the following account : A 'gold book,' consisting 
of a number of plates of gold, fastened together in the 
shape of a book by wires of the same metal, had been 
dug up in the northern part of the State of New York, 
and along with the book an enormous pair of 'gold spec- 
tacles!' These spectacles were so large, that, if a person 
attempted to look through them, his two eyes would have 
to be turned towards one of the glasses merely, the spec- 
tacles in question being altogether too large for the 
breadth of the human face. Whoever examined the plates 
through the spectacles, was enabled not only to read 
them, but fully to understand their meaning. All this 
knowledge, however, was confined at that time to a young 
man, who had the trunk containing the book and spec- 
tacles in his sole possession. This young man was placed 
behind a curtain, in the garret of a farmhouse, and 
being thus concealed from view, put on the spectacles 
occasionally, or, rather, looked through one of the glasses, 



524 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



deciphered the characters in the book, and, having com- 
mitted some of them to paper, handed copies from be- 
hind the curtain, to those who stood on the outside. Not 
a word, however, was said about the plates having been 
deciphered 'by the gift of God.' Everything, in this 
way, was effected by the large pair of spectacles. The 
farmer added, that he had been requested to contribute 
a sum of money towards the publication of the 'golden 
book,' the contents of which would, as he had been as- 
sured, produce an entire change in the world and save it 
from ruin. So urgent had been these solicitations, that 
he intended selling his farm and handing over the 
amount received to those who wished to publish the 
plates. As a last precautionary step, however, he had re- 
solved to come to New York, and obtain the opinion of 
the learned about the meaning of the paper which he 
brought with him, and which had been given him as a 
part of the contents of the book, although no translation 
had been furnished at the time by the young man with 
the spectacles. On hearing this odd story, I changed my 
opinion about the paper, and, instead of viewing it any 
longer as a hoax upon the learned, I began to regard it 
as part of a scheme to cheat the farmer of his money, 
and I communicated my suspicions to him, warning him 
to beware of rogues. He requested an opinion from me 
in writing, which of course I declined giving, and he then 
took his leave, carrying the paper with him. This paper 
was in fact a singular scrawl. It consisted of all kinds 
of crooked characters disposed in columns, and had evi- 
dently been prepared by some person who had before 
him at the time a book containing various alphabets. 
Greek and Hebrew letters, crosses and nourishes, Roman 
letters inverted or placed sideways, were arranged in 
perpendicular columns, and the whole ended in a rude 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



525 



delineation of a circle divided into various compartments, 
decked with various strange marks, and evidently copied 
after the Mexican calendar given by Humboldt, but 
copied in such a way as not to betray the source whence 
it was derived. I am thus particular as to the contents 
of the paper, inasmuch as I have frequently conversed 
with my friends on the subject, since the Mormonite ex- 
citement began, and well remember that the paper con- 
tained anything else but 'Egyptian hieroglyphics.' Some 
time after, the same farmer paid me a second visit. He 
brought with him the golden book in print, and offered 
it to me for sale. I declined purchasing. He then asked 
permission to leave the book with me for examination. I 
declined receiving it, although his manner was strangely 
urgent. I adverted once more to the roguery which had 
been in my opinion practiced upon him, and asked him 
what had become of the gold plates. He informed me 
that they were in a trunk with the large pair of spec- 
tacles. I advised him to go to a magistrate and have the 
trunk examined. He said the 'curse of God' would 
come upon him should he do this. On my pressing him, 
however, to pursue the course which I had recommended, 
he told me that he would open the trunk, if I would take 
the 'curse of God' upon myself. I replied that I would 
do so with the greatest willingness, and would incur 
every risk of that nature, provided I could only extricate 
him from the grasp of rogues. He then left me. 

"I have thus given you a full statement of all that I 
know respecting the origin of Mormonism, and must 
beg you, as a personal favor, to publish this letter im- 
mediately, should you find my name mentioned again by 
these wretched fanatics." 

The points of disagreement between the accounts of 
Harris and Anthon are: 



526 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



(1) Harris declares that he called upon Anthon first 
and afterwards upon Mitchell; Professor Anthon claims 
that he came to him with a note from the Doctor. 

(2) The characters, which Harris says he submitted 
to Anthon, are arranged in horizontal rows ; those which 
Anthon saw were arranged in perpendicular columns. 

(3) Harris claims that some of the characters were 
translated; Anthon makes no mention of such a trans- 
lation. 

(4) Among the characters which Anthon saw were 
a number of stars and half -moons ; these do not appear 
in the transcript which Mormons claim Harris had. 

(5) Harris asserts that Anthon gave him a certificate 
"certifying to the people of Palmyra that they were the 
true characters ;" Anthon says that Harris requested his 
opinion in writing, but that he declined giving it. 

(6) Harris declares that Professor Anthon said, "I 
can not read a sealed book ;" Anthon mentions no such 
admission, and from his condemnation of the characters 
one would infer that no such declaration was ever made. 
And 

(7) Harris says that Professor Anthon pronounced 
the characters Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic; 
the professor says that the whole thing was a "hoax," 
and that it consisted of distorted Hebrew, Greek and 
Roman letters, crosses, half-moons, stars and flourishes. 

The case stands thus : Anthon vs. Harris. Which 
will you believe? On the one hand we have a scholar of 
acknowledged ability and veracity, and on the other an 
ignorant farmer, whom even the Mormons admit lied 
under other circumstances. This interview bears on the 
face of it the marks of being a cleverly laid scheme to 
fulfill a prophecy which had already been fulfilled eigh- 
teen centuries before. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



527 



(1) Are the "Caractors" Egyptian, Chaldaic, As- 
syrian and Arabic? 

The question that is raised by Professor Anthon's 
purported statement is not, "Are the 'Caractors' similar 
to the Egyptian, Assyrian, Chaldaic and Arabic?" but, 
"Are they identical with the written characters of these 
languages ?" Anthon being made to say that they "were 
Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic" and "were 
the true characters." 

In order that the reader may see for himself that 
this claim of identity is utterly false, I have prepared 
Figure 17, which may be compared with Figure 16. 
The Egyptian characters in the former I have copied 
from "Egyptian Language," by Budge ; the Assyrian 
from "First Steps in Assyrian," by King; the Aramaic 
or Chaldee from the Hebrew Bible and the Arabic from 
Gesenius' Lexicon. A careful comparison of the two 
cuts will reveal the fact that the "Caractors" are neither 
identical with the hieroglyphics of the Egyptians, the 
wedge-shape inscriptions of the Assyrians, the block 
letters of the Arameans nor the running hand of the 
Arabians, and the only reasonable conclusion that the 
intelligent reader can come to, in the face of Anthon's 
denial, of ever having made the statement attributed to 
him, and these facts, is that the statement attributed to 
him is a forgery made to fulfill Isa. 29: 11, a prophecy 
which met its fulfillment more than eighteen hundred 
years ago. I challenge the Mormon Church to make 
good the claim that they have flaunted before the Chris- 
tian public for seventy-five years, that the "Caractors" 
are Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic, and de- 
mand that until they do they refrain from using An- 
thon's purported statement further. 



528 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



EGYPTIAN, ASSYRIAN, ARAMAIC AND ARABIC CHARACTERS. 
Egyptian. 

Assyrian. 
Aramaic. 

aim 

Arabic. 

^Xn3' o^/ g/o y—^ LCL 

FIGURE 17. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



529 



In his well-known work, "Doctrines and Dogmas of 
Mormonism," pp. 261, 262, Rev. D. H. Bays, who for 
twenty-seven years was an elder in the Reorganized 
Church, publishes a letter of explanation and inquiry 
concerning the "Caractors," which he had sent to several 
Orientalists, and which reads as follows : 

"Dear Sir: — I herewith inclose what purports to be 
a fac-simile of the characters found upon the gold plates 
from which it is claimed the Book of Mormon was trans- 
lated. The advocates of Mormonism maintain that these 
characters are 'Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic/ 

"So far as I am informed, these characters have never 
been submitted to scholars of eminence for examination ; 
and as the languages named fall within your province, 
including Egyptology and archaeology, your professional 
opinion as to their genuineness will be of great value 
to the general reader, in determining the exact truth 
with respect to this remarkable claim." 

I have omitted from this letter, as not being relevant 
to the present discussion, four questions relating to the 
use of Egyptian and metallic plates among the Hebrews; 
the replies to these questions will also be omitted from 
the letters of his correspondents. 

To the inquiry of Mr. Bays, Pres. James B. An- 
gell, of the University of Michigan, at Ann Arbor, re- 
plied as follows : "I have submitted your letter and in- 
closure to our professor of Oriental languages, who is 
more familiar with the subjects raised by your question 
than I am. He is a man of large learning in Semitic 
languages and archaeology. The substance of what he 
has to say is : 

"'i. The document which you enclose raises a moral 
rather than a linguistic problem. A few letters or signs 
are noticeable which correspond more or less closely to 



530 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



the Aramaic, sometimes called Chaldee language; ior 
example, s, h, g, t, 1, b, n. There are no Assyrian char- 
acters in it, and the impression made is that the docu- 
ment is fraudulent/ " 

In answer to the letter of Mr. Bays, Charles H. S. 
Davis, M.D., Ph.D., of Meriden, Connecticut, author of 
" Ancient Egypt in the Light of Recent Discoveries," 
and a member of the American Oriental Society, Ameri- 
can Philological Society, Society of Biblical Archaeology 
of London and Royal Archaeological Institute of Great 
Britain and Ireland, wrote: "I am familiar with Egyp- 
tian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic, and have consider- 
able acquaintance- with all of the Oriental languages, 
and I can positively assert that there is not a letter to be 
found in the fac-simile submitted that can be found in 
the alphabet of any Oriental language, particularly of 
those you refer to; namely, Egyptian, Chaldaic, As- 
syrian and Arabic. 

"A careful study of the fac-simile shows that they 
are characters put down at random by an ignorant per- 
son — with no resemblance to anything, not even short- 
hand." 

Dr. Charles E. Moldenke, of New York, said to be 
"probably the best Egyptian scholar in the country," re- 
plied to Mr. Bays from Jerusalem, Palestine, December 
27, 1896, as follows : "Your letter dated November 23 
I have just received. I will try to answer your questions 
as far as I am able. I believe the plates of the Book of 
Mormon to be a fraud. 

"In the first place, it is impossible to find in any old 
inscription, 'Egyptian, Arabic, Chaldaic and Assyrian' 
characters mixed together. The simple idea of finding 
Egyptian and Arabic side by side is ridiculous and im- 
possible. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



53i 



"In the second place, though some signs remind one 
of those of the Mesa Inscription, yet none bear a re- 
semblance to Egyptian or Assyrian." 

Although these letters clearly establish that the 
"Caractors" are frauds, Apostle Heman C. Smith, of 
the Josephite Church, in his "Truth Defended; or, A 
Reply to Elder D. H. Bays," takes up the cudgel in their 
defense and in a weak and an evasive effort tries to show, 
first, that Air. Bays misrepresented his church in saying 
that "the advocates of Mormonism maintain that these 
characters are 'Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Ara- 
bic,' " and, secondly, that these letters do not prove what 
he tries to prove by them, as they contradict one another. 

In attempting to answer the charge of Mr. Bays, that 
"the advocates of Mormonism maintain that these char- 
acters are Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic," 
Apostle Smith says : "When Mr. Bays wrote as he says 
he did to certain linguists the following, he misrepre- 
sented the facts : . . . 

" The advocates of Mormonism' have maintained 
nothing of the kind. 

"All there is to it is that Martin Harris has been 
quoted as saying that Professor Anthon so determined 
and informed him." — The Truth Defended, p. 31. 

It is not to be wondered at that the Latter-day Saints 
wish to shirk the responsibility of claiming that the 
"Caractors" are Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Ara- 
bic, especially when a competent scholar declares that 
"there is not a letter to be found in the fac-simile sub- 
mitted that can be found in the alphabet of any Oriental 
language." But the unkindest cut of all is for them to 
try to shift the responsibility of this claim to the 
shoulders of Professor Anthon, and that, too, when he 
has expressly denied that he ever said that the transcript 



532 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



he saw contained Egyptian hieroglyphics, or was any- 
thing else than a hoax and a deception. 

// the Latter-day Saints have not maintained, as 
Apostle Smith tries to make his readers believe, that the 
(C Caractors" are Egyptian, Chaldaie, Assyrian and Arabic, 
why have they given Professor Anthon s purported state- 
ment their unqualified indorsement for the last seventy 
years? And why have they made use of this purported 
statement to sustain their claim that the ancient Ameri- 
cans employed Egyptian, Chaldaie, Assyrian and Arabic 
characters? Apostle Kelley in his "Presidency and Priest- 
hood" commences Chapter XL with a quotation from 
Anthon's letter to Howe, in which it is said that the 
transcript contained "Greek and Hebrew letters, crosses 
and flourishes, Roman letters inverted or placed side- 
ways," and also one from Anthon's purported statement 
to Harris, in which Anthon is made to say that the 
"Caractors" are Egyptian, Chaldaie, Assyrian and Ara- 
bic, and then proceeds to show that in agreement with 
these statements the ancient Americans did employ 
Egyptian, Chaldaie, Assyrian, Arabic, Greek, Hebrew 
and Roman letters. He says, p. 259: "Is there any- 
thing surprising, then, in the discovery of the records 
of these peoples, that they should be found to con- 
tain Hebrew, Greek, Chaldaie, Egyptian and Arabic 
characters? Would it not be more surprising if they 
were not found? Smith was right, then, in his an- 
nouncement that he had discovered and had in his pos- 
session the true characters used in writing by those pre- 
historic nations, and Anthon's statement confirms that of 
Smith, as do also the historical facts cited." If Mr. 
Kelley does not indorse both the purported and the gen- 
uine statement of Professor Anthon, that the characters 
sent to him were Egyptian, Chaldaie, Assyrian, Arabic, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



533 



Greek, Hebrew and Roman, why does he say that "An- 
thon's statement confirms that of Smith" that he "had 
in his possession the true characters," which he (Kelley) 
claims were Hebrew, Greek, Chaldaic, Egyptian and 
Arabic? Why does he seek so diligently to show that 
the writings of the ancient Americans "would appear 
very much as set out by Professor Anthon"? I was 
associated with the Mormon Church from my early 
youth up to my young manhood and Mr. Smith is the 
first whom I have ever heard deny that "the advocates 
of Mormonism maintain that these characters are Egyp- 
tian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic." 

In his effort to destroy the force of the letters of An- 
thon, Angell, Davis and Moldenke, Apostle Smith tries 
to show that they contradict one another. "This is the 
contradictory mass that Mr. Bays relies on as evidence 
in rebuttal. Mr. Angell finds signs on the fac-simile 
more or less closely resembling Chaldee ; Mr. Moldenke 
finds signs that remind one of those on the Mesa In- 
scription ; and Mr. Anthon finds Greek, Hebrew and 
Roman letters ; while Mr. Davis finds no resemblance to 
anything." — The Truth Defended, p. 126. 

But, in the first place, there can be no disagreement 
between Anthon on the one hand and Angell, Davis and 
Moldenke on the other, for they did not see the same 
transcript, that which Anthon saw containing letters ar- 
ranged in perpendicular columns, and that which was 
submitted to the others containing characters arranged 
in horizontal rows. In the second place, the divergence 
of opinion, to which Mr. Smith calls the attention of his 
readers in order to divert their minds from the real 
point at issue, counts for nothing, as it is only such as 
may reasonably be expected when different individuals 
view marks put down at random as the "Caractors" are. 



534 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



It would be almost an impossibility to make a mark with- 
out imitating, more or less closely, the characters of some 
written language, the resemblance being more noticeable 
to some minds than to others. To one of these writers 
the correspondence between some of the "Caractors" and 
the Chaldee is sufficiently close to be mentioned ; to an- 
other they bear no resemblance to anything, not even 
shorthand. In the third place, these writers are a unit 
on the real point at issue. They are agreed that the 
"Caractors" are neither Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian 
nor Arabic, Angell stating that "the impression made is 
that the document is fraudulent ;" Davis, that "there is 
not a letter to be found in the fac-simile submitted that 
can be found in the alphabet of any Oriental language ;" 
and Moldenke, that none of the signs "bear a resem- 
blance to Egyptian or Assyrian." Xo effort that Mor- 
monism may make can vindicate the genuineness of the 
"Caractors ;" they are neither Egyptian, Chaldaic, As- 
syrian nor Arabic. 

(2) Are the "Caractors" American? 

Mormons universally insist that the characters said 
to have been submitted to Professor Anthon were those 
of the official language of the Nephites, and were in use 
in ancient times in both Americas from Peru on the 
south to the Great Lakes on the north. As the ancient 
Americans, like the ancient Egyptians and Assyrians, were 
in the habit of inscribing their hieroglyphics on imperish- 
able materials, if the "Caractors" are genuine, we may 
expect to find them engraved on the monuments of the 
old nations of the Xew World. In order to ascertain 
whether or not characters similar to those said to have 
been submitted to Professor Anthon have been found 
among the antiquities of America, I wrote the following 
letter to the secretary of the Smithsonian Institution: 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



535 



Buchanan, Michigan, Jan. 15, 1908. 
Secretary Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C. 

Dear Sir — Inclosed you will find a fac-simile of the "Carac- 
tors" said to have been copied from the famous Palmyra plates 
by Joseph Smith and sent by him to Prof. Charles Anthon, of 
New York, in February, 1828. Mormons claim that these "Car- 
actors" are "Reformed Egyptian," the language of the ancient 
inhabitants of America, and that Professor Anthon pronounced 
them Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyrian and Arabic. Will you inform 
me if such characters have, to your knowledge, been found on 
any of the monuments or in any of the manuscripts of ancient 
America? Yours truly, Charles A. Shook. 

To my inquiry I received the following reply : 

Washington, D. C, Jan. 28, 1908. 
Mr. Charles A. Shook, Buchanan, Michigan. 

Dear Sir — Your letter of January 15th has been referred to 
Dr. I. M. Casanowicz, of the Division of Historic Archaeology, 
who states that the characters regarding which you make inquiry 
are neither Egyptian nor Chaldaic, Assyrian nor Arabic ; and 
they have not been found on any American monument or manu- 
script. The slip on which the characters are represented is re- 
turned herewith. Very respectfully yours, 

R. Rathbun, . 

Assistant Secretary in charge of the National Museum. 

If the "Caractors" are not Egyptian, Chaldaic, As- 
syrian and Arabic, and have not been found engraved on 
the monuments or inscribed in the manuscripts of ancient 
America, the honest and intelligent reader can come to 
no other conclusion than that they are frauds, which 
have been presented to the public in order to deceive, 
and frauds, too, which were not beyond the ability of a 
Smith and a Harris to execute. 

Even the superficial observer who will only casually 
compare the "Caractors" with the Maya writing (Figures 
18, 19, 20), the most advanced system of ancient Amer- 
ica, will not fail to discover a difference between the two 
as great as that which exists between our own writing 



536 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



and that of the Chinese. The two are fundamentally 
unlike in, at least, two apparent respects. 

In the first place, the "Caractors" are simple figures, 
while the Maya glyphs are complex and are composed 
of a number of elements grouped together and some- 
times surrounded by a rim, as in the Egyptian cartouch. 




FIGURE xS. MAYA HIEROGLYPHICS FROM PALENQUE. 

Permission U. S. Bureau Ethnology. 

Secondly, the "Caractors" are not pictographic in any 
sense, while the Maya glyphs, or parts of them, generally 
retain their pictographic character, being the pictures of 
feet, hands, faces, etc., more or less conventionalized. 
Professor Thomas remarks as follows upon the frequent 
occurrence of human heads: "In all the Maya manu- 
scripts we find the custom of using heads as symbols, al- 
most, if not quite, as often as in the Mexican codices. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



537 



Not only so, but in the former, even in the purely con- 
ventional characters, we see evidences of a desire to turn 
every one possible into the figure of a head, a fact still 
more apparent in the monumental inscriptions." — Third 
Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, p. 64. 




FIGURE 19. MAYA HIEROGLYPHICS FROM COPAN. 

Nowhere in America have characters been found re- 
sembling those said to have been submitted to Anthon, 
except within the mound-area of the United States, and 
even there only upon plates and tablets which are ac- 
knowledged to be archaeological frauds by all good ar- 
chaeologists. The reputation of much of the Mormon 



CVMORAH REVISITED 




FIGURE 20. 
Permission U. S. Bu. Ethno. 



evidence has suffered 
greatly at the hands of 
recent research, as we 
shall soon see. 

(3) The " Carac- 
tors" Are, Many of 
Them, Deformed 
English. 

Instead of "Re- 
formed Egyptian" 
many of the "Car ac- 
tors" are deformed 
English, as any one 
will observe who will 
compare them with 
English letters, figures 
and signs. I have 
counted thirty-six dif- 
ferent characters in 
the fac-simile, some of 
them occurring more 
than once, which are 
either identical with, 
or which closely re- 
s e m b 1 e, the English. 
Figure 21 will illus- 
trate this. The fact is 
that Joseph Smith, in 
drawing the tran- 
script, employed dif- 
ferent kinds and styles 
of English letters, 
changing a few of 
them to make the im- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



539 



posture less observable. 
Latter-day Saints are 
very quick to see a re- 
semblance between the 
"Caractors" and the 
letters in the Maya 
and Egyptian alpha- 
bets of Le Plongeon; 
will they be as quick to 
see the similarity be- 
tween the "Caractors" 
and the English? If 
similarity proves any- 
thing, it proves that 
the transcript is a 
bold, bare forgery and 
one not above the abil- 
ity of a Smith or a 
Harris to execute. 

mormon "collateral 
evidence" frauds. 

From time to time, 
in different parts of 
the territory once in- 
habited by the Mound 
Builders, plates and 
tablets have been 
found containing sup- 
posed hieroglyphical 
writing. In some in- 
stances these "relics" 
have been of copper, 



Mormon 


English 


Caractors 


Characters 


/ 


/ 


% 


% 


3 


3 






> 


s 




6 


7 


7 






5 


1 


0 


0 


O /- / 




i 
• 


I, 

4 
• 




? 


T 


■f 


A 


A 




A 




JS 


c 


c 


ID 


jn 


; 


(o 


V 


? 


1 


$ 


J. L 


/¥ 


J 


3 


L 


L 


r\ 
U 


n 


-t~ 
V 


t 




of 


u 


U 


lr 


If 


y< 


X 


o 


(_) 







FIGURE 



540 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



-but in most they have been of stone ingeniously en- 
graved. Chief among these plates and tablets are the 
Grave Creek Tablet, said to have been found in the 
large burial mound at Grave Creek, West Virginia, in 
1838 ; the Kinderhook Plates, found in a mound at Kin- 
derhook, Pike County, Illinois, in 1843; the Newark 
Tablet, discovered by David Wyrick near Newark, Ohio, 
in i860; the Davenport Tablets, taken from mounds near 
Davenport, Iowa, in 1877; and the remains of a copper 
musical instrument, found near Mendon, Illinois, in 1888. 

These plates and tablets are among the choicest of 
the evidences of Mormonism, and Mormon writers de- 
vote considerable space in their works on American ar- 
chaeology to their description, asserting that they estab- 
lish two of their claims : That the Mound Builders em- 
ployed a phonetic system of writing, and that they 
wrote on metallic plates. Elder Etzenhouser writes : 
"The claim of the Book of Mormon that the ancient 
American nations had written on metallic plates, was 
thought to be its sure defeat; but plates and various 
materials containing hieroglyphical writing have since 
been found in such abundance that the claim is now 
fully sustained." — The Book Unsealed, p. 42. Follow- 
ing this he gives descriptions of the Kinderhook Plates, 
the Mendon Plates and the Davenport Tablets, having 
previously given an account of the Newark Tablet. 

But of the plates and tablets mentioned there is 
not one whose claim to genuineness has been positively 
established, because of which they are all rejected by 
most archaeologists, though two of them have found a 
few who have been willing to come to their defense. 
Some of these "relics" have been made and "planted" 
out of simple mischief ; others, to establish certain re- 
ligious beliefs ; and still others, to be found and sold at 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



541 



a fabulous price as specimens. But these facts the Mor- 
mons persistently ignore, repeatedly referring to these 
finds as though there were no question as to their gen- 
uineness. 



The Grave Creek Tablet was found on the 16th day 
of June, 1838, during the excavation of the large burial 
mound at Grave Creek, West Virginia. At the time of 

its excavation this 
mound was owned 



FIGURE 22. GRAVE CREEK TABLET. o " a * l lcii ^cl 111 

height was sunk 
into the mound upon the north side, along the original 
surface, to the depth of in feet, at the end of which 
a vault was discovered twelve feet long by eight wide 
and seven high. This vault was formed by upright 
timbers placed around the sides supporting others which 
served as a roof. The latter decaying away, a great mass 
of earth and stones had fallen into the i«terior. In this 
vault two skeletons were found, one of which was sur- 
rounded by 650 shell beads. After this another shaft was 
sunk into the mound from the summit, and, at a distance 
of thirty-four feet from the bottom, another chamber was 
discovered containing one skeleton surrounded by over 



The Grave Creek Tablet. 




by Mr. Jesse Tom- 
linson, the entire 
work of opening it, 
which cost twenty- 
five hundred dol- 
lars, being under 
the direction of Mr. 
Abelard B. Tomlin- 
s o n. At first a 
shaft ten feet in 



542 



CVMORAH REVISITED 



two thousand shell discs, two hundred pieces of mica, 
seventeen bone beads and copper bracelets and rings 
weighing seventeen ounces. It was in this vault that the 
tablet mentioned is said to have been found. 

The Grave Creek Tablet is described as "an oval disc 
of white sandstone nearly circular in form, about three- 
fourths of an inch thick, and an inch and a half in diam- 
eter." — The Mound Builders, p. 91. On one of its sides 
were engraved three lines of "characters," twenty-two 
in all, and a peculiar symbol formed of a naked sword 
and a human head. 

Many have been the attempts to decipher the sup- 
posed hieroglyphics on this tablet. One scholar found 
among them four characters which he claimed were an- 
cient Greek : another claimed that four were Etruscan ; 
five were declared to be Runic ; six, ancient Gaelic ; 
seven, old Erse ; ten, Phenician ; fourteen, old British ; 
and sixteen, Celtiberic. M. Maurice Schwab, in 1857, 
translated the inscription to read: "The Chief of Emi- 
gration who reached these places (or this island) has 
fixed these statutes forever." At a conference of Amer- 
icanists held at Nancy, in 1875. M. Levy Bing reported 
that the inscription contained twenty-three Canaanite 
letters which he translated as follows : "What thou say- 
est, thou dost impose it. thou shinest in thy impetuous 
clan and rapid chamois." And M. Oppert. to give addi- 
tional variety, translated it: "The grave of one who was 
assassinated here. May God to avenge him strike his 
murderer, cutting off the hand of his existence." 

But even among those who consider this tablet a 
genuine mound relic there is a strong doubt as to the 
characters representing a written language. MacLean, 
who believes that it was found as stated, says : "This 
stone has been given more importance than it really 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



543 



merits. The inscription takes in too wide a range of 
alphabetical characters to represent one distinctive lan- 
guage. If it does represent a language, then inscriptions 
containing similar characters would have been found in 
different localities. If, in reality, it does represent a 
language, then the Mound Builders must be placed 
higher in the scale of civilization than any other nation 
has ever attained under similar conditions. That the 
stone or tablet was deemed of some importance by the 
owner is proved from the fact of its having been en- 
tombed with him. It may have possessed, to him, some 
mysterious importance in his journey to the future state 
of existence; and hence a charm to protect him from 
the evil influences that might beset him." — The Mound 
Builders, p. 94. 

If, then, this stone is genuine, it may have been in- 
scribed by the hand of an European and buried in the 
mound after 1492, as there is a strong probability that 
the mound is of comparatively recent erection ; or it may 
have been engraved by an American Indian without any 
reference to an alphabet and without any intention of 
conveying an idea phonetically, the marks being simply 
put down at random and the whole used as an amulet or 
charm. Before this tablet can be made to do service as 
evidence that the Mound Builders employed an alphabet 
it must be proved that the characters or marks are alpha- 
betic, and this can not be done. 

Elder Phillips tells us that "some of the characters 
on this tablet resemble Book of Mormon characters tran- 
scribed by Joseph Smith." — Book of Mormon Verified, 
p. 34. But this proves nothing, as some of them more 
or less closely resemble the English ; for instance, the 
letters A, D, T and X and the figures 1, 4 and 8. This 
shows the fallacy of such an argument. 



544 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



But there are a number of reasons for believing this 
tablet to be a fraud 

In the first place, its anomalous character would seem 
to prove it such. "Science and civilization,'' says Dr. 
Haven, "do not leave solitary monuments," and if the 
Mound Builders had possessed a written language we 
should find more evidences of it than a few characters 
carved upon a single piece of sandstone. Says Professor 
Thomas: "The folly of relying upon such relics as this 
Grave Creek Tablet as evidence of a written language is 
apparent from the above conclusions. That Schoolcraft 
and other savants mentioned could have believed the in- 
scription to have been alphabetic, and a genuine mound- 
builder's relic, and yet made up of several alphabets, 
would be inconceivable but for the undeniable evidence. 
This simple fact ought to be sufficient to cast it aside as 
unworthy of consideration. However, it may be added 
that since Dr. Daniel Wilson's sharp criticism, and Pro- 
fessor Reed's critical examination of the evidence, this 
relic is discarded by most archaeologists." — Twelfth 
Rept. Bit. Am. Ethno., p. 632. 

Again, the contention among those who excavated 
the mound in regard to who found it would seem to bring 
it further into disrepute. Mr. A. B. Tomlinson, who 
directed the work, declares : "I removed it with my own 
hands." And Mr. P. B. Catlett, who did the brickwork, 
just as strongly declares: "I was the man who found the 
stone." Besides this, a report current soon after the find- 
ing of the tablet that it had been manufactured by one 
David Gatewood, and dropped into the excavation as a 
hoax, has also done much to weaken the evidence of its 
genuineness in the minds of most archaeologists. 

For these and other reasons the tablet is pretty gen- 
erally thought to be fraudulent. Colonel Whittlesey de- 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



545 



clares that it "is now universally regarded by archaeolo- 
gists as a fraud." — Archaeological Frauds, No. 33. 
Short says : "The 'Grave Creek Mound Tablet' we be- 
lieve is now shown unquestionably to be an archaeological 
fraud." — North Americans of Antiquity, p. 419. Foster 
says : "The alphabetical characters inscribed on the 
'Grave Creek Stone,' and the 'Holy Stone of Newark' 
with its Hebrew letters, which have called out from 
philologists a wonderful amount of learning, one is dis- 
posed involuntarily to associate with the famous stone 
which served as the basis of Mr. Pickwick's fame." — 
Prehistoric Races, p. 400. While Brinton, after mention- 
ing the graphic systems of the Mexicans and Mayas, the 
pictographs of the Panos, the quipu of the Peruvians 
and the wampum and mnemonic aids of other American 
tribes, remarks : "This exhausts the list. All other 
methods of writing, the hieroglyphs of the Micmacs of 
Acadia, the syllabic alphabet of the Cherokees, the pre- 
tended traces of Greek, Hebrew, and Celtiberic letters 
which have from time to time been brought to the notice 
of the public, have been without exception the products 
of foreign civilization or simply frauds." — Myths, p. 28. 

When Mormon archaeologists have established the 
genuineness of the Grave Creek Tablet it will then be 
time for them to discuss the close similarity of its char- 
acters to the "Caractors" of Joseph Smith's transcript. 

The Kinderhook Plates. 

The notorious Kinderhook Plates were found in a 
mound near Kinderhook, Pike County, Illinois, April 23, 
1843. The account of their finding, as written by Dr. 
W. P. Harris, and published in the Mormon paper, the 
Times and Seasons, of Nauvoo, Illinois, is as follows : 



546 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



To the Editor of the "Times and Seasons" : — 

On the 1 6th of April, 1843, a respectable merchant, by the 
name of Robert Wiley, commenced digging in a large mound 
near this place; he excavated to a depth of ten feet and came 
to rock. About that time the rain began to fall, and he 
abandoned the work. On the 23d, he and quite a number of the 
citizens, with myself, repaired to the mound, and after making 
ample opening, we found plenty of rock, the most of which 
appeared as though it had been strongly burned ; and after re- 
moving full two feet of said rock, we found plenty of charcoal 
and ashes, also human bones that appeared as though they had 
been burned; and near the eciphalon a bundle was found that 
consisted of six plates of brass, of a bell-shape, each having a 
hole near the small end and a ring through them all, and clasped 
with two clasps. The ring and clasps appeared to be iron, very 
much oxidated ; the plates first appeared to be copper, and had 
the appearance of being covered with characters. It was agreed 
by the company that I should cleanse the plates. Accordingly, 
I took them to my house, washed them with soap and water and 
a woolen cloth ; but finding them not yet cleansed, I treated them 
with dilute sulphuric acid, which made them perfectly clean, on 
which it appeared that they were completely covered with char- 
acters, that none, as yet, have been able to read. Wishing that 
the world might know the hidden things as fast as they come to 
light, I was induced to state the facts, hoping that you would 
give them an insertion in your excellent paper, for we all feel 
anxious to know the true meaning of the plates, and publishing 
the facts might lead to the true translation. They were found, 
I judge, more than twelve feet below the surface of the top of 
the mound. 

I am most respectfully, a citizen of Kinderhook, 

W. P. Harris, M.D. 

With this letter appeared the following certificate, 
signed by nine of the citizens of Kinderhook: 

We, citizens of Kinderhook, whose names are annexed, do 
certify and declare, that on the 23d of April, 1843, while exca- 
vating a large mound in this vicinity, Mr. R. Wiley took from 
said mound six brass plates, of a bell-shape, covered with ancient 



548 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



characters. Said plates were very much oxidated. The bands 
and rings on said plates mouldered into dust on a slight pressure. 



This account of the finding of these plates has ever 
been put to good use by the Mormons. Whenever the 
claim that the Mound Builders employed a phonetic sys- 
tem of writing is questioned it is immediately referred 
to ; and from the pulpit and through the press it is flung 
out as an answer to the challenge to produce the evidence 
that the ancient Americans wrote upon plates of metal. 

Within a few days after the finding of these relics 
Joseph Smith came out with a translation of them. In 
his Diary for Monday, May I, 1843, appears the fol- 
lowing : 

I insert facsimiles of the six brass plates found near Kinder- 
hook, in Pike County, Illinois, on April 23, 1843, by Mr. R. 
Wiley and others. While excavating a large mound they found 
a skeleton about six feet from the surface of the earth, which 
must have stood nine feet high. The plates were found on the 
breast of the skeleton and were covered on both sides with 
ancient characters. 

I have translated a portion of them and find they contain 
the history of the person with whom they were found. He was 
a descendant of Ham. through the loins of Pharaoh, King of 
Egypt, and that he received his kingdom from the Ruler of 
Heaven and Earth. 

Apostle Kelley gives us a fac-simile of the twelve 
sides of these six plates in his "Presidency and Priest- 
hood," and also a long description of them copied from 
the Quincy Whig, and then adds: "There are characters 
on these plates that resemble letters in the Egyptian, 
Greek, Roman, Chaldaic and Hebrew alphabets, and they 



Robert Wiley, 
w. loxgxecker, 
Geo. Deckexsox, 
G. W. F. Ward, 



Ira S. Curtis, 
J. R. Sharp, 
Fayette Grubb, 
W. P. Harris, 



W. FUGATE. 



' CUMORAH REVISITED 



549 



are arranged in commns, resemDlmg very much in form 
and arrangement, according to Professor Anthon, the 
ones that were submited to him by Mr. Harris, as copied 
by Mr. Smith from the plates in his possession, from 
which he translated the 'Book of Mormon;' yet none 
would be so audacious as to presume to say that they 
had been copied by some 'bungling' hand, with the vari- 
ous ancient alphabets, as mentioned, before him, with a 
view to perpetrate a fraud." — Presidency and Priest- 
hood, p. 283. 

That the Kinderhook Plates were engraved by a 
"bungling" hand some have been just audacious enough 
to presume to say. We have on hand a full confession 
of the imposture by one of those implicated in it, and by 
that confession we learn that these plates were made of 
copper, not brass, by the "bungling" hands of Bridge 
Whitton, the village blacksmith, and that they were en- 
graved by the "bungling" hands of two of his confeder- 
ates, Robert Wiley and Wilbur Fugate, for the express 
purpose of hoaxing the Mormons. 

Mr. Wilbur Fugate, one of the nine witnesses who 
signed the certificate given above, wrote the following 
letter to Mr. James T. Cobb, of Salt Lake City, Utah, 
which explains how and why this fraud was perpetrated. 

Mound Station, Illinois, June 30, 1879. 

Mr. Cobb: — 

I received your letter in regard to those plates, and will say 
in answer that they are a humbug, gotten up by Robert Wiley, 
Bridge Whitton and myself. Whitton is dead. I do not know 
whether Wiley is or not. None of the nine persons who signed 
the certificate knew the secret, except Wiley and I. We read 
in Pratt's prophecy that "Truth is yet to spring up out of the 
earth." We concluded to prove the prophecy by way of a joke. 
We soon made our plans and executed them. Bridge Whitton 
cut them (the plates) out of some pieces of copper; Wiley and 



550 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



I made the hieroglyphics by making impressions on beeswax and 
filling them with acid and putting it on the plates. When they 
were finished we put them together with rust made of nitric acid, 
old iron and lead, and bound them with a piece of hoop iron, 
covering them completely with the rust. Our plans worked 
admirably. A certain Sunday was appointed for digging. The 
night before, Wiley went to the mound where he had previously 
dug to the depth of about eight feet, there being a flat rock 
that sounded hollow beneath, and put them under it. On the 
following morning quite a number of citizens were there to 
assist in the search, there being two Mormon elders present 
— Marsh and Sharp. The rock was soon removed, but some 
time elapsed before the plates were discovered. I finally picked 
them up, and exclaimed : "A piece of pot metal !" Fayette Grubb 
snatched them from me and struck them against the rock and 
they fell to pieces. Dr. Harris examined them and said they 
had hieroglyphics on them. He took acid and removed the rust, 
and they were soon out on exhibition. Under this rock was 
dome-like in appearance, about three feet in diameter. There 
were a few bones in the last stage of decomposition, also a few 
pieces of pottery and charcoal. There was no skeleton found. 
Sharp, the Mormon elder, leaped and shouted for joy, and said 
Satan had appeared to him and told him not to go (to the 
diggings), it was a hoax of Fugate and Wiley's, but at a later 
hour the Lord appeared and told him to go, the treasure was 
there. 

The Mormons wanted to take the plates to Joe Smith, but 
we refused to let them go. Some time afterward a man assum- 
ing the name of Savage, of Quincy, borrowed the plates of 
Wiley to show to his literary friends there, and took them to 
Joe Smith. The same identical plates were returned to Wiley, 
who gave them to Professor McDowell, of St. Louis, for his 
Museum. W. Fugat 



W. Fugate, being first duly sworn, deposes and savs that the 
above letter, containing an account of the plates found near 
Kinderhook, is true and correct to the best of his recollection. 



Subscribed and sworn to before me this 30th day of June, 



State of Illinois, 
Brown County. 




W. Fugate. 



1879. 



Jay Brown, J. P. 



CVMORAH REVISITED 



551 



The exposure of this fraud not only leaves the Mor- 
mon Church with one less prop for its claim that the 
Mound Builders wrote upon metalic plates and employed 
an alphabet, but it also proves Joseph Smith to be a 
false prophet and a deceiver for claiming to translate 
them. 

The Newark Tablet. 

The "Hebrew relics" found in mounds near Newark, 
Ohio, in the year i860, are relied upon by Mormon 
archaeologists to prove their claim that the ancient Amer- 
icans were of Jewish descent. The description of these 
relics, as given in the Prophetic Watchman of Septem- 
ber 14, 1866, is as follows: 

"CURIOUS RELICS ANCIENT ISRAELITES IN AMERICA. 

"We are all more or less acquainted with the so-called 
'Indian Mounds' found in various parts of our country. 
There are hundreds of them in Ohio alone — several near 
Newark, Licking County. Pipes, copper beads strung 
upon a vegetable fiber, human skeletons, skulls, bones of 
animals and birds, some charred by fire, as if they had 
been sacrificed upon a burning pile, have been obtained 
from them. For centuries it has been a most interesting 
subject of inquiry as to who built these mounds, and 
whence came their builders. Within the past few years 
some relics have been discovered, which are thought to 
throw light on the subject: 

"The first is a little coarse sandstone, not quite an 
inch and a half high by about two inches long. It was 
found in the 'Wilson Mound,' and bears the face of a 
human being. On the forehead are five distinct Hebrew 
characters, which are interpreted to mean : 'May the 
Lord have mercy on him (or me) an untimely birth,' 
evidently an expression of humiliation. 



552 



CUM ORAM REVISITED 



"The second relic from the same mound is stone, 
closely resembling limestone. It is rather triangular 
than square in its form, and yet it differs widely from 
both. It represents an animal, and contains four human 
faces and three inscriptions in Hebrezu, signifying de- 
votion, reverence and natural depravity. 

"The third stone was found in i860, about three miles 
from Newark. It has a shape like a wedge, and is about 
six inches long, tapering at the end. On one end is a 
handle, and at the top are four Hebrew inscriptions. 

"The last relic is an object of much interest. It was 
found in i860, and has engraved upon it a figure of 
Moses, and the Ten Commandments. One side is de- 
pressed, and the reverse protrudes. Over the figure is a 
Hebrew word signifying 'Moses.' The other inscriptions 
are almost literally the words found in some parts of the 
Bible, and the Ten Commandments are given in part 
and entirely — the longest being abbreviated. The alpha- 
bet used, it is thought, is the original Hebrew one, as 
there are letters known in the Hebrew alphabet (not) now 
in use, but bearing a resemblance to them. All things on 
this stone point to the time before Ezra, to the lost 
tribes of Israel, and the theory is that some one of 
these tribes found their way into this continent, and 
settled where the State of Ohio now exists." — Quoted 
in <( Joseph the Seer," pp. 157, 158. 

Apostle Blair also gives a number of other quota- 
tions from the periodicals of that time describing these 
tablets, and then remarks : "Now from these relics we 
learn just what was claimed by the Book of Mormon 
over thirty years before their discovery, (1) that the 
ancient inhabitants of America possessed a knowledge 
of, and wrote upon enduring substances, a modified form 
of the Hebrew language; (2) that they possessed the 



CD MO RAH REVISITED 



553 



writings of Moses and the prophets up to the times of 
Jeremiah, including the first part of his writings to 
chapter 17, verse 9, 'The heart is deceitful,' etc. . . . 
We find (3) that these sacred writings were hidden up 
in 'a stone box,' as were the plates of the Book of Mor- 
mon. Here, then, is a chain of evidence in support of 
the claims of the Book of Mormon that is as strong as 
it is strange, and one that can not fail to fasten con- 
viction upon the mind of the unprejudiced enquirer, 
while it joyfully confirms the faith of the believer." — 
Joseph the Seer, pp. 160, 161. 

The last relic mentioned in the Prophetic Watchman 
is the one that Mr. Blair refers to when he says that 
"these sacred writings were hidden up in 'a stone box.' " 
It is described by Mr. A. A. Bancroft as follows : "About 
eight miles southeast of Newark there was formerly a 
large mound composed of masses of freestone, which 
had been brought from some distance and thrown into a 
heap without much placing or care. In early days, stone 
being scarce in that region, the settlers carried away the 
mound piece by piece to use for building purposes, so 
that in a few years there was little more than a large 
flattened heap of rubbish remaining. Some fifteen years 
ago, the county surveyor (I have forgotten his name), 
who had for some time been searching ancient works, 
turned his attention to this particular pile. He employed 
a number of men and proceeded at once to open it. Be- 
fore long he was rewarded by finding in the center and 
near the surface a bed of the tough clay generally known 
as pipe-clay, which must have been brought from a dis- 
tance of some twelve miles. Imbedded in the clay was a 
coffin, dug out of a burr-oak log, and in a pretty good 
state of preservation. In the coffin was a skeleton, with 
quite a number of stone ornaments and emblems, and 



554 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



some open brass rings, suitable for bracelets or anklets. 
These being removed, they dug down deeper, and soon 
discovered a stone dressed to an oblong shape, about 
eighteen inches long and twelve inches wide, which 
proved to be a casket, neatly fitted and completely water- 
tight, containing a slab of stone of hard and fine quality, 
an inch and a half thick, eight inches long, four inches 
and a half wide at one end, and tabering to three inches 
at the other. Upon the face of the slab was the figure 
of a man, apparently a priest, with long, flowing beard, 
and a robe reaching to his feet. Over his head was a 
curved line of characters, and upon the edges and back 
of the stone were closely and neatly carved letters. The 
slab, which I saw myself, was shown to the Episcopalian 
clergyman of Xewark, and he pronounced the writing to 
be the Ten Commandments in ancient Hebrew." — Native 
Races, Vol. V.j pp. 94, 95. 

But this relic is a fraud. 1 After attracting world- 
wide attention and being made the basis of a vast amount 
of speculation, the true character of the Newark Tablet 
was exposed by accident after its owner's death. It 
seems that one David Wyrick, the county surveyor of 
Licking County, had espoused the belief that the Mound 
Builders were the descendants of the Lost Ten Tribes. 
Searching for years among their antiquities for evidence 
of this theory and finding none, he at last conceived the 
idea of manufacturing the tablet, burying it in the mound 
described and digging it up again in order to bring the 
scientific world to his belief. Xo one doubted his story 
until after his death, when the administrator, in cleaning 
up his office, found in a back room a number of pieces of 
slate upon which he had practiced carving Hebrew let- 

1 "Primitive Man in Ohio," Preface, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



555 



ters, and a Hebrew Bible with the identical figure of 
Moses, which appeared on the tablet, as a frontispiece. 
Archaeologists have manifested considerable charity for 
Wyrick, however, believing that he had become half- 
crazed by repeated attacks of rheumatism and his failure 
to find the evidence he so long sought. 

The best brief account of the operations of this man 
that I have seen is given in MacLean's "Mound Build- 
ers," pp. 119-121: "David Wyrick, of Newark, Ohio, 
was an uneducated man, but on the subject of mathe- 
matics possessed decided ability. He had held the office of 
county surveyor until he was forced to retire on account 
of long-continued attacks of acute rheumatism. He was 
regarded as an eccentric character and incapable of de- 
liberate deception. He had adopted the idea that the 
Hebrews were the builders of the earthworks of the West, 
and as often as his disease would permit he sought dili- 
gently for proofs of his theory. His first discovery was 
made during the month of June, i860. This discovery 
consisted in what is known as the 'Newark Holy Stone/ 
and was found about a mile southwest of the town, near 
the center of an artificial circular depression, common 
among the earthworks. As soon as he found it he ran 
away to the town, and there with exultation exhibited it 
as a triumphant proof of his Hebrew theory. Upon ex- 
amination it proved to be a Masonic emblem representing 
the 'Key Stone' of an arch formerly worn by Master 
Masons. The Hebrew inscription has been thus ren- 
dered into English: 'The law of God, the word of God, 
the King of the earth is most holy.' The stone did not 
have the appearance of antiquity, and probably was acci- 
dentally dropped into the depression, and then covered 
over by the accumulation of loam and vegetable matter 
continually washed into the center of the cavity. 



556 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



"Wyrick continued his researches and soon made a 
startling discovery. During the summer of i860, with 
three other persons, he repaired to the spot where the 
stone mound had stood and there dug up the trough 
which had been re-entombed by the farmers in 1850. In 
the following November Wyrick, with five other men, 
met at this spot and made still farther examinations. 
They found several articles of stone, among which was 
a stone box enclosing an engraved tablet. Upon one 
side of the tablet is a savage and pugnacious likeness of 
Moses, with his name in Hebrew over his head. Upon 
the other side of this stone is an abridgment in Hebrew 
of the Ten Commandments. Archaeologists never had 
much faith in the Holy Stone, and the discovery of Moses 
and the Ten Commandments soon established Wyrick's 
character as an impostor. 'Not long after this he died, 
and in his private room, among the valuable relics he had 
so zealously collected, a Hebrew Bible was found, which 
fully cleared up the mystery of Hebrew inscriptions 
"even in Ohio." This had been the secret and study of 
years by a poverty-stricken and suffering man, who, in 
some respects, was almost a genius. His case presents 
the human mind in one of its most mysterious phases, 
partly aberration and partly fraud.' " 

The latter part of this quotation is an extract from 
Whittlesey's "Archaeological Frauds," Tract No. 9. 

It seems that others were also implicated in these 
frauds, as the following will show : 

"A correspondent from Newark, Ohio, warns us that 
any inscribed stones said to originate from that locality 
may be looked upon as spurious. Years ago certain 
parties in that place made a business of manufacturing 
and burying inscribed stones and other objects m the 
autumn, and exhuming them the following spring in the 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



557 



presence of innocent witnesses. Some of the parties to 
these frauds afterwards confessed to them ; and no such 
objects, except such as were spurious, have ever been 
known from that region." — Science, Vol. III., No. 62, p. 
467. 

This is an editorial note supplementary to the ac- 
count of the exhibiting of an inscribed stone, said to have 
been found at Newark, Ohio, by Dr. N. Roe Bradner, at 
the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, which 
was published in the same magazine, Vol. III., No. 58, 
P- 334- 1 

I am willing to let the reader decide for himse u 
whether or not the inscribed stones from Newark con- 
stitute "a chain of evidence in support of the claims of 
the Book of Mormon that is as strong as it is strange, 
and one that can not fail to fasten conviction upon the 
mind of the unprejudiced enquirer." 

The Davenport Tablets. 

In the year 1874 the Rev. Mr. Gass, an archaeologist, 
began the exploration of a group of ten or twelve 
mounds about a mile below the city of Davenport, Iowa. 
These mounds were situated about two hundred and fift} 
feet from the Mississippi River and from eight to twelve 
feet above low-water mark. Excavations brought to 
light human bones and such articles as sea shells, copper 
hatchets, arrow-heads, pieces of galena, pieces of pot- 
tery, pipes and copper spool-shaped ornaments. One of 
the mounds in this group, known as Mound No. 3, which 
was about three feet high by sixty feet in diameter, was 
found to contain two graves. Only one of these was 
opened at that time and was found to contain five skel- 
etons, two of them evidently intrusive burials. With 



1 March 14, 1884. "Fourth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 247. 



558 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



the three which pertained to the original interment were 
found copper axes, carved stone pipes, bear's teeth, etc. 

The second grave was not opened until the year 1877, 
when it was explored by Mr. Gass and a party of ar- 
chaeologists. Near the surface they found such modern 
relics as glass beads and the fragments of a brass ring, 
while at the bottom they found lying together on a bed 




FIGURE 24. DAVENPORT TABLET. 



of hard clay the two inscribed tablets about which so 
much has been written. The larger of these tablets is 
about twelve inches long by from eight to ten inches 
wide, and is made of dark coal slate; the smaller is about 
seven inches square and has small holes bored in the 
upper corners. 

On one of the sides of the larger tablet is what has 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



559 



been named the "cremation scene." It is the picture of 
a mound upon whose summit a fire is burning. Around 
this is a circle of figures, evidently going through some 
kind of a dance, as they have hold of hands, while lying 
prostrate on the ground are a number more, who, it has 
been suggested, are human sacrifices about to be offered. 
Above the cremation scene are symbols of the sun and 
moon and above these an arch formed by three curved, 
parallel lines between and above which are a number of 
peculiar characters, some of them Arabic figures and 
Roman numerals. 

On the reverse side of this tablet is what has been 
called the "hunting scene." Grouped promiscuously be- 
neath a large tree which occupies the foreground are a 
number of men, animals and birds. Of men there are 
eight; of bison, four; of deer, four; of birds, three; of 
hares, three; of Rocky Mountain goats, one; of fish, 
one; of wolves, one; and of nondescript beasts, three. 
It has been stated that this scene suggests the knowl- 
edge that the ancient Americans had of the flood, as four 
of the human figures are said to be females, while a fifth 
has the appearance of a patriarch, probably Noah. 

The smaller tablet has been called the "calendar 
stone," as it contains twelve zodiacal signs and three con- 
centric circles. I copy the following description of it 
from Elder Walker's "Ruins Revisited," p. 210: "This 
tablet . . . represents a planetary configuration, the twelve 
signs of the Zodiac, known to all nations of old, and the 
seven planets, conjoined with six different signs. . . . 
The figures of the signs are the same which we find 
depicted on Egyptian, Greek, Roman and other monu- 
ments. . . . The signs Aries, Taurus, Gemini, are plain 
enough. Gemini is expressed by two sitting children, 
like the constellation of Gemini, at present Castor and 



56o 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Pollux. Cancer is expressed by the head and shears of 
the animal. Leo and Virgo are likewise naturally de- 
lineated ; and Virgo, as it seems to me, bears in her hand 
Spica. The same is to be said of the figures of Libra, 
Scorpio and Sagitarius. The latter is expressed by a 
bow and arrow, being nearly invisible. Capricornus was, 
as we learn from the astronomical monuments of the 
Egyptians, a species of antelope, and the same animal, 
though a little deformed, resembles our Capricornus. 
Aquarius and Pisces explain themselves, for the former 
was on ancient monuments, very often symbolized by an 
ampora. . . . These short lines placed below Pisces, 
Gemini, Virgo and Sagitarius argue that at that time, 
at the beginning of spring, the sun stood in Pisces." 

Another tablet of limestone was found in Mound 
No. ii of this group by the president of the Davenport 
Academy of Science, Mr. Charles Harrison, in 1878. 
On this tablet were rudely drawn a circle representing 
the sun, a crescent representing the moon, and . a figure 
astride the circle which was colored a bright red. This 
is said to be the "memorial of a great eclipse of the sun." 

The conclusions that have been drawn from these 
tablets are given by Mr. Walker as follows : 

"1. The primitive inhabitants of America were no 
pre- Adamites, nor offspring of the monkeys, but No- 
achites. 

"2. They belonged to the same nation by which Mex- 
ico and South America were populated, after the dis- 
persion of the nations in 1590 B. C. 

"3. The literature of the American Indians evidences 
that they immigrated from Japan or Corea or proper 
China. 

"4. They must have come over prior to the year 1579 
B.C. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



56i 



"5. Our Indians, as well as those in Mexico and 
South America, knew the history of the deluge, es- 
pecially that Noah's family then consisted of eight per- 
sons. 

"6. The primitive inhabitants of America were much 
more civilized than our present Indians. 

"7. The former understood the art of writing and 
used a great many syllabic characters, based upon the 
Noachian alphabet, and wrote from left to the right 
hand, like the Chinese. 

"8. They were acquainted with the seven planets and 
the twelve signs of the zodiac, and they referred the 
same stars to the same constellations as did the Chal- 
deans, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans and others. 

"9. They had solar years and solar months, even 
twelve hours of each day. They knew the cardinal 
points of the zodiac, and cardinal days of the year. 

"10. Their religious creed was that of the Babylo- 
nians, Egyptians, Assyrians, Greeks, Romans, etc., be- 
cause they worshiped the planets and the twelve gods of 
the zodiac by sacrifices." — Ruins Revisited, pp. 210, 211. 

These conclusions, with the preceding description of 
the "calendar stone," were copied by Mr. Walker from 
the "Report" of the Davenport Academy for 1882. He 
expresses his faith in the genuineness of these tablets 
in these words : "Some persons whose positions require 
that they should object to the above report now, or for- 
ever hold their peace, have arisen and objected; but with 
the many concordant facts before it, it falls into line 
without a shock." — Ibid, p. 211. 

But the genuineness of these relics has never been 
satisfactorily established. Many archaeologists reject 
them without question, while some others regard them 
simply as within the ability of modern Dakota tribes. 



562 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



A number of things have worked against their gen- 
uineness. For instance, among the characters between 
the second and third parallel lines in the so-called 
"cremation scene," the word TOWN is very plainly 
to be made out, while in the "hunting scene" one of the 
men has on a modern hat. The figure 8 also occurs three 
times and the letter O seven. Adding to these facts 
the fact that the so-called "calendar stone'' has a de- 
cidedly modern and European appearance and the reader 
will observe that their claim to genuineness is, to say 
the most, a very doubtful one. Professor Thomas says : 
"A consideration of all the facts leads us, inevitably, to 
the conclusion that these relics are frauds: that is, they 
are modern productions made to deceive." — Twelfth 
Rept. Ba. Am. Ethno., p. 642. 

But the presence of English letters and numerals on 
these tablets can be very plausibly explained by the 
theory that they were the work of some modern Dakota 
who not only understood the pictography of his own 
tribe, but who was also familiar with a few English signs 
and characters. This is the opinion of a number of 
our archaeologists. Dellenbaugh says : "The Davenport 
tablet has been pronounced, on good authority, to be 
within the powers of the Dakota tribes." — North Ameri- 
cans of Yesterday, p. 68. 

This seems to have been demonstrated by Mr. 
Horatio N. Rust, of Pasadena, California, who pre- 
sented drawings of the scenes on these tablets to a num- 
ber of Dakota Indians. He says : "As I made the 
acquaintance of several of the older and more intelligent 
members of the tribe, I took the opportunity to show 
them the drawings. Explaining that they were pictures 
copied from stones found in a mound, I asked what they 
meant. They readily gave me the same interpretation 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



563 



(and in no instance did either interpreter know that an- 
other had seen the pictures, so there could be no col- 
lusion )." 1 

According to their interpretation the mound in the 
"cremation scene" is simply a dirt lodge, like those in 
use among different Indian tribes, from the aperture in 
the roof of which smoke is seen ascending. The figures 
hand-in-hand indicate that a dance is in progress, while 
the three prostrate on the ground, instead of being 
"human sacrifices," are those of two men and a woman 
who have fallen down exhausted. The smoke issuing 
from the roof indicates that it is winter-time and that 
fire is needed. The readiness and uniformity with which 
the Sioux interpreted these tablets would seem to indi- 
cate that they are genuine mound relics, manufactured 
by a member, or members, of the Dakota tribes, while 
the English letters and numerals and the "modern hat" 
would just as plainly seem to imply that they were man- 
ufactured after the engraver had become familiar with 
our civilization. The ten conclusions quoted by Mr. 
Walker from the "Report of the Davenport Academy" 
are simply preposterous and ridiculous. 

The Mendon Plates. 

The following description of certain plates with in- 
scriptions upon them, said to have been found near Men- 
don, Illinois, is taken from the St. Louis Chronicle of 
February, 1889: 

"Rev. S. D. Peet, the well-known antiquarian, is re- 
ported as having found in Illinois two cross plates which 
have all the appearance of being rude musical instru- 
ments. These plates are about fifteen inches square and 
there are places for strings and a bridge. Along the 



1 "Fourth Rept. Bu. Am. Ethno.," p. 251, 



564 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



lower edge is a row of hieroglyphics similar to those on 
the famous Palmyra plates, said to have been discovered 
by Joseph Smith and from which he interpreted the 
Book of Mormon." 

This quotation is another very sweet morsel for the 
Mormon tongue. I find it in "The Book Unsealed," p. 
4.4 ; "The Book of Mormon Vindicated," p. 45, and "The 
Book of Mormon Verified," p. 31. 

Deciding that the best way to get at the truth in this 
matter was to write to Mr. Peet himself, I sent the fol- 
lowing letter, dated at Buchanan, Michigan, August 6, 
1907: 

Rev. S. D. Peet, Chicago, Illinois: 

Dear Sir — In several Mormon works, treating on American 
archaeology, I find the following quotation, said to be taken 
from the St. Louis Chronicle of February, 1889: "Rev. S. D. 
Peet, the well-known antiquarian, is reported as having found 
in Illinois two cross plates which have all the appearance of 
being rude musical instruments. These plates are about fifteen 
inches square and there are places for strings and a bridge. 
Along the lower edge is a row of hieroglyphics similar to those 
on the famous Palmyra plates, said to have been discovered by 
Joseph Smith and from which he interpreted the Book of Mor- 
mon." The Mormons employ this quotation to prove that the 
ancient Americans used hieroglyphics, similar to those said to 
have been discovered by Joseph Smith, and that they wrote upon 
metallic plates. Will you kindly answer the following ques- 
tions: (1) Did you find such plates? (2) If so, are you certain 
that they are of pre-Columbian origin? (3) Did they have upon 
them "a row of hieroglyphics similar to those on the famous 
Palmyra plates said to have been discovered by Joseph Smith"? 

Yours, Charles A. Shook. 

To this inquiry Mr. Peet replied from Chicago, 
August 8, 1907, as follows : 

"As to the musical instrument which was found near 
Mendon, not far from Quincy, Illinois, near a house that 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



565 



had been occupied by a Mormon, I have nothing more 
to say than has been published. It was probably the top 
of a fiddle which somebody tried to make out of a piece 
of sheet copper. There was no such thing as a revelation 
contained on it." 

I also find a note in his "Mound Builders," p. 44, 
touching the same point: "It has been intimated that the 
Mormons planted these tablets." — Davenport. — "The re- 
cent find at Mendon, Illinois, of a brass plate or sound- 
ing-board of a musical instrument, with similar char- 
acters, near a house once occupied by Mormons, confirms 
this conjecture." 

Can it be that the Mormons buried these plates in 
order to suggest to their finders the possibility of there 
being some truth in the claim of Joseph Smith that he 
found metallic plates in Hill Cumorah? 

CONCLUSION. 

In closing this chapter and this book, I wish to bring 
before the reader in summarized form a few of the 
facts which I believe have been fully established in the 
preceding pages : 

(1) That the American race is, and has been, one 
from the close of the Glacial Period to the present, and 
that the American Indians are not descendants of the 
children of Israel. 

(2) That the civilization of the ancient races was in- 
digenous and was not derived from either Egypt or Pal- 
estine, the analogies brought forward to prove such a 
derivation being mere coincidences. 

(3) That none of the ancient peoples had attained to 
the stage of culture attributed to the peoples of the Book 
of Mormon, being ignorant of the arts of smelting and 
working iron and the use of alphabetic characters. 



566 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



(4) That the theory of extinct races — that is, extinct 
in the sense in which Mormons use the term — is a pure 
fallacy, the ancient Mound Builders, Cliff Dwellers, Cen- 
tral Americans, Mexicans and Peruvians being the direct 
ancestors, in both blood and culture, of those races found 
here by the whites. 

(5) That the ancient races were neither Jews nor 
Christians, but pagans and worshipers of the elements 
and phenomena of nature, mountains, rocks, trees, beasts, 
birds and men. 

(6) That the ancient empires were very small as 
compared with the continent and did not comprehend 
parts of both Americas. And 

(7) That the trend of migration in the Northern 
Continent was from north to south, instead of in the 
opposite direction. 

Written across the claim of the historical credibility 
of the Book of Mormon, in letters so bold that every 
intelligent, honest eye may read them, is the word 
"TEKEL," "thou art weighed in the balances, and art 
found wanting." 

THE END. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



567 



APPENDIX 



THE BOGUS RELICS FROM MICHIGAN 

Since the foregoing pages were written ana placed 
in the hands of the publishers, the attention of the public 
has been called to certain supposed "relics," said to have 
been found in the mounds of the State of Michigan. 
These purported antiquities are plates of copper, tablets 
of clay and stone, caskets of clay and other objects, most 
of which have curious pictographs and hieroglyphics en- 
graved or stamped upon them. 

It seems that three men are now most zealously advo- 
cating the genuineness of these "finds" — Mr. Daniel E. 
Soper, formerly Secretary of State; Rev. James Savage, 
a priest in the Roman Catholic Church, and Elder Ru- 
dolph Etzenhouser, a minister of the Reorganized 
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, all of whom 
now reside in the city of Detroit 

These gentlemen have recently put out a booklet, en- 
titled "Engravings of Prehistoric Specimens from Mich- 
igan, U. S. A.," which contains forty-four photographic 
cuts of the objects mentioned, and which is gotten up 
for the purpose of arousing in these things "the interest 
of students of philology or those engaged in historical 
and archaeological research." In the introduction to this 
brochure Mr. Etzenhouser says : 

"Students of American archaeology will find in the 
following pages reproductions of the monuments of a 
race of primitive Americans, monuments of a people 



568 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



whose existence has hitherto been involved in an obscurity 
as complete as that which envelopes their history. Some 
of the specimens are of stone, some of copper and others 
of clay. They have been unearthed for the most part 
through the efforts of amateur investigators, and repre- 
sent the contents of hundreds of mounds scattered over 
the Lower Peninsula of Michigan. The language in- 
scribed on these tablets has not as yet been interpreted, 
but will doubtless, some day, succumb to the advance of 
philology, and they will perhaps yield an interesting 
chapter to the ancient history of this continent." 

With all due respect to the obvious honesty of the 
three gentlemen whose names have been mentioned, I 
must say that these startling "finds" bear on the face of 
them the very marks of imposture and have undoubtedly 
been manufactured and buried in the mounds by some in- 
dividual or some gang of individuals either for pure mis- 
chief or to be sold at fancy prices to unwary collectors, 
and so line the pockets of the fabricators. 

My reason for noticing these frauds here is that they 
have been made to do service in behalf of Mormonism, 
and have, within the last year, been held up before the 
public by representatives of that delusion as proof that 
the ancient Americans wrote upon metallic plates and 
employed an hieroglyphical system of writing. It is also 
probable that they will continue to be so employed by the 
enthusiastic elder unless their fraudulent character is 
fully exposed, although, I am informed, even some of 
the representatives of the Reorganized Church ques- 
tioned their genuineness at their recent Conference, held 
at Independence, Missouri. It may be that their experi- 
ences with the "Kinderhook Plates," the "Newark Tab- 
let" and other similar "finds" have taught them that dis- 
cretion, after all, is the better part of valor. 



CVMORAH REVISITED 



569 



About the year 1890 interest in American antiquities 
had reached a high pitch. The Ohio mounds were being 
scientifically examined by Professors Putnam and Moore- 
head, and other archaeologists, and the daily papers were 
full of the accounts of their discoveries. The deep in- 
terest in these things created a market for all kinds of 
archaeological specimens, and in some instances fabulous 
prices were paid for them. It was during this period of 
interest in American antiquities that the first of these 
Michigan "relics" were found. In October, 1890, a man 
digging post-holes, discovered a small clay cup in a field 
near Wyman, Montcalm County. This created some 
little stir, but in the following spring, when other and 
more curious objects were found, the people of that 
vicinity became highly excited. At Stanton, the county- 
seat of Montcalm County, a "syndicate" was formed for 
the purpose of pushing the work of research, and mound 
after mound and undulation after undulation were ex- 
cavated with the result that a surprisingly large number 
of objects were brought to light. These consisted chiefly 
of clay tablets and clay caskets, whose lids were sur- 
mounted with lions, sphinxes and other figures, all bear- 
ing certain marks which were taken for hieroglyphics. 
In order to satisfy the public of the finding of these 
"relics," affidavits were made, some of them subscribed 
to by men of probity and honor, and every effort was put 
forth to establish the fact that these so-called "an- 
tiquities" had been found in the mounds as claimed. By 
this time the attention of scientific men was attracted, 
and a number of expert archaeologists began to make 
investigations. But these investigations did not prove to 
be highly creditable to these purported "antiquities." 
Certain marks of imposture, which would be unob- 
servable to an unpracticed eye, were easily detected. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Prof. Alfred Emerson, of Lake Forest College, after a 
careful examination on the ground, wrote : "The articles 
were bad enough in the photograph ; an examination 
proved them to be humbugs of the first water." Other 
scientists followed him with caustic criticisms, and under 
these repeated attacks the craze finally subsided and for 
some years little was heard of these "relics." 

But some two or three years ago they were again 
brought to the front by the finding of similar objects 
in other parts of the State, and to-day are creating no 
little attention in some sections and with a certain class. 
The fabricators, profiting by the criticisms of the past, 




have improved their wares and have been more careful 
in hiding them away, and the archaeologist is now con- 
fronted with a perplexing medley of representations of 
the Deluge and the Tower of Babel, war scenes in which 
bands of American Indians are meeting in mortal combat 
a race to us unknown, views probably suggested by 
Egyptian mythology and Egyptian, Assyrian and Pheni- 
cian characters. 

Fortunately for science, however, there are certain 
common characteristics which link all these frauds to- 
gether into one grand deception. Whether they come 
from Montcalm, Wayne or Crawford County, whether 
they were found in 1891 or 1908, they all, with few, if 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



571 



any, exceptions, have on them one character (Fig. i) 
which has been called the "sign manual" of the forger. 
This being true, to expose one is to expose all. 

One of the chief reasons for rejecting these objects 
as spurious is their anomalous character. They are 
wholly unlike the general run of relics that have been 
taken from the mounds throughout the rest of the United 
States. In 1819 Caleb Atwater surveyed and excavated 
the prehistoric works at Circleville, Ohio ; between the 
years 1845 and 1847 Squier and Davis opened more than 
two hundred mounds throughout the Mississippi Val- 
ley; and since then thousands upon thousands have 
been examined in all parts of the country (some 
of them in Michigan), and that, too, by such ex- 
perienced archaeologists as Thomas, Moorehead, Fowke 
and Putnam, and yet, throughout all this time and 
territory, not a single relic like those found in 
Michigan has ever been discovered. It remained for 
the "amateurs" of that State to find in a few hundred 
mounds of insignificant size what our experts failed to 
find during nearly one hundred years of research in the 
largest and most skillfully constructed monuments of 
the mound-building people. If the Mound Builders em- 
ployed Egyptian and Assyrian hieroglyphics in the State 
of Michigan, they certainly would have employed them 
elsewhere, and our archaeologists would have discovered 
them ere this. 

Another reason for rejecting these "finds" is that 
they have no concomitant and cumulative evidence to 
support the claim of their genuineness. If they represent 
a people at all, it is a people who were familiar with 
the civilization of Egypt, Assyria and Palestine. And 
yet, what have they left as traces of their existence? 
Nothing but a few caskets, plates and tablets. They 



572 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



built no temples, no palaces, no pyramids; they lived 
like Indians, fought like Indians, died like Indians and 
were buried like Indians ; but they knew all about the 
flood, Noah's ark and the tower of Babel; were familiar 
with Egyptian mythology and employed characters from 
the languages of the Egyptians and Assyrians! If a 
colony of people had come to Michigan centuries ago 
from Egypt or Assyria, they would have done more than 
simply to engrave Deluge tablets or to make clay caskets ; 
they would have cultivated the soil, built roads, cut stone 
and erected structures consistent with their knowledge 
of civilization. When a few ruined temples, palaces and 
pyramids have been discovered it will then be time for 
archaeologists seriously to consider the claims of the 
Detroit trio relative to these "relics." 

The evident marks of imposture that some of these 
objects bear is still another reason for rejecting them. 
On this point, Professor Emerson says of those found in 
Montcalm County: 

"They were all of unbaked clay, and decorated with 
bogus hieroglyphics in which cuneiform characters ap- 
peared at intervals. These were all stamped. By way 
of economizing labor the characters were turned upside 
down sometimes, or laid sideways. On the back of one 
piece the characters were represented whole lines at a 
time. There were incumbent lions on some lids of the 
caskets. Of these, one or two had no tail. I told one 
of the gentlemen that a primitive artist would never 
make such an omission. He said that the society had 
found the same fault, and that afterward pieces with 
good tails had been found. On opening one casket we 
found that the lid had been dried on a machine-sawed 
board." — Quoted in "Some Archaeological Forgeries 
from Michigan," a paper by Prof. Francis W. Kelsey, 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



573 



published in the "American Anthropologist" for January- 
March, 1908. 

On these forgeries Professor Kelsey also speaks as 
follows : 

"Some of the tablets were found in the caskets, as 
were also small pieces of copper, apparently made by 
beating common coins out smooth and impressing char- 
acters upon them with a small chisel. In one casket 
fifteen of the dies used in stamping on clay were said to 
have been found, but I know nothing of their character. 
A few crude vases and some other objects were brought 
to light. The material of the caskets, the tablets and the 
small sphinx which after a time I myself examined, was 
a light-colored clay, containing so large a percentage of 
drift sand as to make the objects fragile. The drying, 
done either in the sun or by exposure to mild heat, had 
left cracks, the edges of which were sharp and fresh. 
The material disintegrated readily in water; the objects 
could therefore have been in the ground only a short 
time before they were dug out." 

Still another objection to be urged against these 
"finds" is the preposterous jumbling together of char- 
acters and signs from different written languages. The 
"sign manual" is undoubtedly drawn from the Assyrian, 
in which the first character, the perpendicular wedge, is 
frequently used as a determinative placed before male 
proper names. — First Steps in Assyrian, p. 39. Figure 2, 
which occurs on some of the tablets, is also frequently 
employed in Assyrian as the ideogram for "chief." — Ibid, 
p. 97. In Plate 21 of Mr. Etzenhouser's booklet we have 
several columns of hieroglyphics in which certain Egyp- 
tian characters are readily made out, especially those for 
a, k and t. Beneath these columns of characters we have, 
very probably, a scene suggested by Egyptian mythology. 



574 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Three American Indians appear to be making an offer- 
ing to Osiris or some other god whose lower extremi- 
ties are encased in garments that strongly resemble a 
pair of baggy pantaloons, while he holds in his hand an 
Egyptian key. The offerings consist of rings, which 
were used for money in ancient Egypt (Smith's "Bible 
Dictionary," Art., "Money"), and probably fowls and 
beasts, as the head and neck of the first is portrayed, 
while above this is a figure which strongly suggests the 
head, rump and tail of a calf. Beneath this mytho logic 
device are scratched marks to us unknown, with others 
that bear a very close similarity to the Egyptian. On 
the opposite side of the tablet we have the bust of a per- 
sonage with strongly marked Anglo-Saxon features. 
This personage has on his head a peculiarly shaped hel- 
met. This is a sample of the curious medley which Mr. 
Etzenhouser says "will doubtless, some day, succumb to 
the advance of philology." It might not be out of place 
to state here that it has undoubtedly succumbed already. 

I have taken considerable pains to ascertain the 
opinions of a number of our leading archaeologists on 
these "finds," and, while one of them has expressed him- 
self somewhat perplexed over the external evidences, 
they all, with one accord, declare that the internal evi- 
dences plainly indicate cases of fraud. In a letter, which 
I received April 28, 1910, Mr. F. W. Hodge, Ethnologist- 
in-charge of the Bureau of American Ethnology, Smith- 
sonian Institution, says : 

"Answering your letter of the 25th instant, addressed 
to the secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, I beg 
leave to say that members of this Bureau have ex- 
amined a number of the objects referred to by you, and 
also many photographs of others, and it is the general 
opinion that they were made by some one for purposes.of 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



575 



deception. You will find an article on the subject by 
Prof. Francis W. Kelsey, president of the Archaeological 
Institute of America, published in the American An- 
thropologist for January-March, 1908." 

In the article referred to, Professor Kelsey says: 

"The forgeries of which I have spoken differ from 
all others which I have examined in this, that they are 
unsophisticated. The forger did not know enough about 
genuine relics of any class to make intelligent imitations. 
He had never seen the things which he undertook to 
reproduce ; he translated roughly into substance a med- 
ley of representations which he had found in books or 
magazines and which, in his working sketches, he jum- 
bled together after the manner of a child. It is fortunate 
for collectors that so wily a forger had not a better un- 
derstanding of his business. His product is in a class 
with the 'petrified man' of William Ruddock, which was 
alleged to have been found in 1876, in the Pine River 
region of Michigan, whence most of the Scotford 'finds' 
have come. The 'petrified man' was itself an echo of the 
Cardiff Giant, and may possibly in turn have suggested 
these ventures in a new field. One of my friends thinks 
'forgeries' too dignified a word to apply to such objects; 
he would call them simply 'fakes.' " 

In a letter, dated at Salem, Massachusetts, May 10, 
1910, Rev. S. D. Peet, editor of the American Anti- 
quarian, says : 

"The booklet I have not seen, but I should call the 
relics frauds. You may rely on one thing, that anything 
found underneath the soil with an alphabet or letters 
from any alphabet on it is a fraud. There might be 
pictographs — snakes, birds, animals and human forms — 
but prehistoric alphabets are not found in America." 

Under date of May 4, 1910, Prof. James H. Breasted, 



576 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



director of the Haskell Oriental Museum, University of 
Chicago, wrote : 

"'I have received your inquiry regarding the Michigan 
antiquities, or the so-called 'antiquities,' with great in- 
terest. I did not know that Mr. Etzenhouser is a Mor- 
mon or that the Mormons are pushing these Michigan 
finds in their own behalf. Mr. Etzenhouser wrote me a 
short time ago, asking my opinion of these finds and 
mailing me at the same time a copy of his brochure con- 
taining cuts of the slate and copper tablets. I enclose 
you a copy of my reply to Mr. Etzenhouser. There can 
be absolutely no doubt of the modern origin of these 
alleged antiquities. Forgeries pass over my desk in this 
museum every few days. This Michigan lot are about 
the worst I ever saw." 

In his letter to Mr. Etzenhouser, which was written 
before he was aware of the fact that that gentleman was 
a Mormon or that the Mormons were making use of 
these ''finds" to support their claims Professor Breasted 
said : 

"I have no hesitation in saying that the inscriptions 
on these slate tablets and copper plates, etc., are clumsy 
forgeries, made by combining badly drawn Egyptian 
hieroglyphs, cuneiform signs of Assyria, and other signs 
into a preposterous and impossible whole." 

In closing this paper I recommend that every anti- 
Mormon polemic obtain the booklet put out by Mr. 
Etzenhouser, "Engravings of Prehistoric Specimens 
from Michigan, U. S. A.," and also Professor Kelsey's 
paper, "Some Archaeological Forgeries from Michigan," 
in the American Anthropologist for January-March, 
1908. The first can be obtained of Mr. Etzenhouser at 
57 Selden Avenue, Detroit, Michigan, for $1 : the second, 
from Mr. B. Talbot B. Hyde, treasurer of the American 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 577 

Anthropological Association, 542 Fifth Avenue, New 
York City, New York, for $1.25. 

Charles A. Shook. 
Palmer, Illinois, June 1, 1910. 



578 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



INDICES 



I. AUTHORS. 

American Antiquities (A. W. Bradford), 143, 145, 156, 212, 

235, 479- 

American Antiquarian, 495. 

American Race, The (D. G. Brinton), 74, 80, 82, 124, 143, 
146, 158, 162, 166, 167, 170, 178, 225, 228, 241, 273, 305, 325, 364, 
365, 382, 495. 

Ancient America (J. D. Baldwin), 127, 154, 177, 224, 225, 
249. 268, 313, 347, 352, 361. 

Ancient Cities of the New World (Desire Charnay), 125, 177. 
Ancient Monuments and Ruined Cities (S. D. Peet), 366. 
Annals Louisiana Hist. Coll., 310. 

Archaeological Frauds (Col. Charles Whittlesey), 545. 

Atlantis (Ignatius Donnelly), 145, 479. 

Aztecs, The (Lucien Briart), 234, 409, 423, 429. 

Bible Dictionary (Wm. Smith), 198. 

Biedma, Louisiana Hist. Coll., Vol. II., 309. 

Book of Mormon (twenty-second edition), 49, 50, 140, 243, 
244, 263, 264, 295, 336, 372, 380, 382, 439, 465. 

Book of Mormon Lectures (H. A. Stebbins), 58, 130, 140, 
142, 151, 159, 161, 165, 166, 175, 186, 206, 210, 218, 240, 246, 250, 
261, 328, 373. 390, 401. 404, 405- 438, 466. 

Book of Mormon Verified (A. B. Phillips), 160, 327, 377, 417, 
543- 

Book Unsealed, The (R. Etzenhouser), 58, 218, 466, 467, 540. 

Cherokees in Pre-Columbian Times, The (Cyrus Thomas), 
116, 265. 266, 289, 312, 313. 

Chronicle, The St. Louis (February, 1889), 564. 

Compendium of Geography of Central and Southern America, 
Vol. II.. 494. 

Conquest of Mexico, Vol. III. (W. H. Prescott), 347, 352, 
378, 397, 420. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



579 



Conquest of Peru, Vol. I. (W. H. Prescott), 128, 338, 348, 377. 
Descent of Man, The (Charles Darwin), 166. 
Discovery of America, Vol. I. (John Fiske), 318, 519. 
Divinity of Book of Mormon Proven by Archaeology (Miss 
Louise Palfrey), 218. 

Doctrines and Dogmas of Mormonism (D. H. Bays), 529, 530. 
Earth and Its Inhabitants, The (E. Reclus), 222. 
Encyclopedia, Britannica, 351, 354. 
Encyclopedia (Johnston's), 275. 

Essays of an Americanist (D. G. Brinton), 61, 66, 72, 129, 171, 
314, 360, 369, 483, 485, 490, 506, 511, 515. 

Evening and Morning Star, The (February, 1907), 514. 
Evolution (Alexander Winchell), 381. 

Explorations in Bible Lands in the Nineteenth Century (H. 
V. Hilprecht), 375. 

Explorations in the West (F. V. Hayden), 381. 

Footprints of Vanished Races (A. J. Conant), 265. 

Gentleman of Elvas, Bradford Club Series, Vol. I., 310. 

Garcilasso de la Vega, Hist, de la Flor., 310. 

History of Mormonism (E. D. Howe), 523. 

History of the U. S. (George Bancroft), Vol. III., 469, 
482, 489. 

History of the U. S. (Clark Ridpath), 177. 

Incidents of Travel in Central America (J. L. Stephens), 360. 

Introduction to the Study of North American Archaeology 
(Cyrus Thomas), 67, 87, 99, 103, 153, 163, 164, 227, 229, 230, 231, 
232, 235, 236, 269, 271, 276, 281, 284, 297, 363, 367, 379, 382, 507. 

Jesuits in North America, The (F. Parkman), 391, 412, 440. 

Joseph the Seer (W. W. Blair), 59, 340, 342, 346, 414, 552. 

Man and His Migrations (R. G. Latham), 181. 

Manual of Young (Mormon) Men's Mutual Improvement 
Association, 491. 

Mayan Primer (D. G. Brinton), 404, 508, 513. 

Mediation and Atonement (John Taylor), 405. 

Modern Knowledge of American Antiquities (H. A. Steb- 
bins), 130. 

Mormon Portraits (Dr. W. Wyl), 549. 

Mound Builders, The (J. P. McLean), 178, 235, 265, 267, 379, 
449, 461, 509, 542, 555. 

Mound Builders, The (S. D. Peet), 451, 465. 



58o 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



Mound-building Age in America, The (Dr. C. A. Peterson), 

275, 279. 

Myth of the Manuscript Found (George Reynolds), 56. 

Myths and Symbols, or Aboriginal Religions (S. D. Peet), 
408, 417. 449. 458. 

Myths of the New World (D. G. Brinton), 60, 62, 63, 64, 125, 
145. 153. 155- 188. 235. 275, 325, 361, 391, 392, 393, 395, 400, 412, 
416, 439. 440, 515, 545. 

Narrative and Critical History of America (Justin Windsor), 
133. 134- 

Native Races of the Pacific States, Vol. I.. 146, 494; Vol. II., 
196, 216, 241, 349. 427. 503, 519; Vol. III., 197, 331, 359, 395, 392, 
398, 399- 403. 417. 483. 495; Vol. IV., 127, 128, 162. 170, 221, 
223, 242, 249, 265, 296, 366. 368, 378, 379. 448, 454. 460, 508, 510; 
Vol. A'., 121, 123, 124, 126, 151, 173, 176, 182, 227, 236, 237, 238, 
329, 332, 342, 346. 347. 353, 354. 357, 457, 478, 479, 480, 553. 

Nature and Man in America (N. S. Shaler), 74, 275. 

North Americans of Antiquity (John T. Short), 120, 121, 156, 
157. 216, 223, 236, 238, 241, 278, 327. 347, 361. 402, 519, 545. 

North Americans of Yesterday (F. S. Dellenbaugh) , 66, 72, 
144, 153, 163, 178, 292, 301, 336, 347. 353, 360, 362, 378, 382. 387. 
392, 395, 436, 437. 481- 482. 484, 488, 490. 509- 519. 562. 

Objections to the Book of Mormon and the Book of Doctrine 
and Covenants Answered and Refuted (J. R. Lambert), 578. 

Opinions of Sixty-rive Leading Ministers and Bible Com- 
mentators on Isa. 29: 11-24 and Ezek. 37: 15-20 (C. J. Hunt), 58. 

Palacio Carta (E. G. Squier). 241. 

Peru (E. G. Squier), 509. 

Pratt's Works, Orson, 56, 59, 113, 180. 

Preadamites (Alex. Winchell), 68. 162, 234. 

Prehistoric America (Marquis de Nadaillac), 108, 121, 122, 
128, 130, 162, 222, 224, 226, 247, 265, 277. 283, 288, 294, 296, 297, 
300, 314, 362, 366, 378, 379- 382. 385. 446. 457- 509. 519, 521. 

Prehistoric Man (Daniel Wilson), 269. 

Prehistoric Races of the United States (J. W. Foster), 135, 
169, 177, 182, 277. 280, 282, 352. 361. 449, 460. 481, 482. 545. 

Presidency and Priesthood (W. H. Kelley), 58. 189, 223, 239, 
261, 327, 498, 503. 518, 532. 548. 

Primitive Man in Ohio (W. K. Moorehead), 287, 290. 305. 
379, 5ii. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Problem of the Ohio Mounds (Cyrus Thomas), 248, 283, 301, 
302, 305. 

Prophetic Watchman, 551. 

Reports, Bureau American Ethnology, L, 187, 209, 392, 395, 
485; II., 70, 270, 281, 391, 395; HI., 536; IV., 301, 562; XII., 256, 
291, 374, 544, 562; XVI., 163, 376, 515; XVII., 163, 391; XIX., 
282, 283, 318. 

Report of the Committee on American Archaeology (W. H. 
Kelley, F. M. Sheehy, Wm. Woodhead), 48, 51, 54, 58, 223, 262, 
264. 

Researches (E. B. Taylor), 241. 

Review of the Evidence Relating to Auriferous Gravel Man 
in California (W. H. Holmes), 70. 

Ruins Revisited by an Americanist (S. F. Walker), 147, 477, 
559, 561. 

Saints' Herald, 493. 

Schoolcraft's Archaeology (Henry Schoolcraft), 199. 
Science, 556. 

Smithsonian Report (1891), 293, 295. 

Some Considerations on the Mounds (Colonel Force), 304. 
Story of Mexico (Susan Hale), 225. 

Ten Tribes of Israel, The (Timothy Jenkins), 183, 187, 190, 
192, 193, 197, 198, 201, 204, 207, 208, 475. 

Text-book (A. H. Parsons), 138. 

Text Book of Geology (J. D. Dana), 380. 

Times and Seasons, 545. 

Travels in Mexico (F. S. Ober), 222, 234. 

Truth Defended, The (H. C. Smith), 531, 533. 

Two Lectures on the Book of Mormon (J. E. Talmadge), 
402, 466. 

Types of Mankind (J. C. Nott and Geo. R. Gliddon), 170, 490. 

Uncivilized Races of Men (J. G. Wood), 191. 

Voice of Warning, A (P. P. Pratt), 189, 436, 437, 466. 

Vestiges of the Mayas (Le Plongeon), 362. 

Walam Olum (D. G. Brinton), 317. 

Work in Mound Exploration (Cyrus Thomas), 247, 285, 290, 
319- 

II. SUBJECTS. 
Ablutions and anointings, 197. 
Adultery, punishments of, 202, 



5& 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



Agriculture. Indian. 294. 302-305. 324 ; Jaredite. 244, 263, 287; 
Xephite. 56. 244. 287. 
Albinos, 144, 146. 

Algonkins, color of, 145: built mounds, 273, 314; location of, 
71, 80; migrations of, 235. 272: myths of, 333. 
Alphabets, 502, 511. 513. 514. etc. 
Altars, 88. 106, 107, 444 456, 457. 
Amazon, stocks of the, 82. 

American Antiquarian Society, organization of. 133. 

American Race, unity of. 60. 171: physical variations of. 60; 
a distinct race. 61. 77: origin of. 53. 63, 64, 135, 139, 140; 
antiquity of, 64, 65, 68, 166. 171 : stocks of, 78-85. 

"Amerind," derivation of name. 61. 

Analogies. Egyptian. 340-357. 514: Jewish, 136. 137. 173. 175, 
1S0: Madagascaran. 211: Mongolian. 212: Polynesian, 212: value 
of. 180-183. 341. 358, 387, 437, 481: to Christian faith, 329, 402. 

Arawacks, 82. 

Araucanians. 84. 

Arch, absence of. in America. 325. 337. 

Archaeology, relation of to the question of the credibility of 
the Book of Mormon. 56-59. 

Architecture, American. 95-107. 229, 233, 270, 295, 296, 323, 
3 2 5- 337-340, 360. 368. 446-451 : Egyptian, 351-354 : Jewish, 336-340. 

"Area of Characterization," 65, 326. 

Ark of the covenant 206. 

Athapascas, 78, 433. 

Aymaras. 60, 84. 365. 

Aztecs. 81. 217. 227. 228, 258, 356, 396, 506. 
Bacabs, the four, 403. 
Baptism. 22. 198, 389. 420, 422. 

Behring Strait, supposed immigration across, 74. 177. 
Bison, 76. 
Bochica. 148, 150. 

Book of Mormon, historical outline of, 47-56, 139, 140; 
geography of. 112. 
Brass. 243. 

Bronze, tools of. 377. 378. 506. 
Busk (puskita), 193. 
Caddoes. Si. 
Cakchiquels. 81, 122. 



CUM OR AH REVISITED 



583 



Calaveras skull, 69. 

Calendar, 119, 191, 324, 348-351, 360, 526, 561. 
Canaris, 84. 

Cannibalism, 291, 322, 419. 
"Caractors," 20, 521-539. 
Caribs, 82, 468. 
Cave animals, 76, 167. 

Chata Muskokis, location of, 80; works of, 273, 319; move- 
ments of, 235, 272. 

Cherokees, location of, 80, 116; works of, 282, 311; relation- 
ship of, 116, 272, 315; number of, 293; movements of, 116, 271; 
myths of, 333, 434; name of, 317. 

Chibchas (see Muyscas). 

Chichimecs, 120, 217, 224. 

Chicomoztoc, 231, 232, 328, 335. 

Chimus (see Yuncas). 

Chontals, 81, 494. 

Chronology, 47, 70, 120, 123, 128, 129, 139, 152, 220, 235, 237, 
242, 274-276, 363, 367, 369, 508. 
Chulpas, 157. 

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, founding of, 24. 
Cities of Refuge (see peace towns). 
Circumcision, 196. 

Civilization, Book of Mormon, Jaredite, 51, 243, 286; Nephite, 
56, 244, 286. 

Civilization, American, indigenous, 64, 77, 139, 248, 357-363; 
grade of, 287 ; comparative term, 322 ; origin of, 223, 229, 234, 
321, 326; antiquity of, 274-286, 363-372. 

Cliff Dwellers, 91-95, 159-165, 232, 369, 375. 

Cloth (see textile fabrics). 

Colhuas, 119, 224, 255. 

Comparisons, Hebro-Indian, 467-477. 

Complexion, 53, 60, 140, 142-165, 212, 220. 

Contact of ancient Mayas and Nahuas, 235-239. 

Continuity of American races, 159-165, 239-243. 

Copper, 53, 298, 305, 323, 372. 

Coriantumr, 51, 54, 334. 

Coronado, 160, 165. 

Cox Cox, 330. 

Craniology, 60, 148, 159, 165-170, 221, 268, 315, 344- 



584 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Creeks, language of, 468. 
Cross, 102, 414-417, 421, 459. 
Cuemani, 496. 

Cumorah, Hill, 19, 46, 55, 119, 137, 142, 565. 

Customs, burial, 158, 159, 164, 206, 208, 294, 302, 375; mar- 
riage, 202; miscellaneous, 322-324. 

Dakotas (or Sioux), location of, 80; possible authors of the 
Davenport tablet, 562 ; flood myth of, 332, 333. 

Deities, Indian, 322, 359, 390-396; Peruvian, 127, 396; Mayan, 
398; Aztecan, 345, 396, 429; Egyptian, 344. 

De Soto, 279, 282, 284, 309. 

Devil, 389, 411-414. 

Division into tribes, 183, 358. 

Empires, extent of ancient, 243. 

Eschatology, 359, 438-443- 

Eskimos, 60, 78. 

Eucharist, 426. 

Extermination of the Jaredites, 51, 136, 239, 334; of the 
Nephites, 55. 

Feast of first firstfruits, 193. 

Flattening, head, 221. 

Florida bone, 68. 

Food, supposed unclean, 291. 

Forest trees, growth of, 279, 280, 368. 

Fortifications, earthen, 86, 87, 296, 305, 316. 

Four brothers, Peruvian myth of, 128, 154. 

French writers on mound building, 284, 310. 

Gadiantons, 160. 

Gentile system, 213, 322, 360. 

Glacial period, 66-75, 380. 

God, words for in American tongues, 392. 

Gods (see deities). 

Gold, 108, in, 243, 244, 372. 

Gorgets, 313. 

Governments, Indian, 183-186, 323; of Book of Mormon 
peoples, 50, 51, 252. 

Graves, stone, 168, 273, 315, 319. 
"Great Spirit," 186, 187, 387, 389, 391, 443. 
Green-corn dance (see busk). 
Guadaloupe man, 68. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



585 



Gucumatz, 148, 150, 394, 432. 
Hagoth, 55, 492. 

"Happy Hunting-ground," 387, 390. 
Hell, 439, 443 (see Eschatology). 
Henotheism, 385. 

History, two epochs in Peruvian, 127, 365. 
Horse, 51, 53, 76, 214, 380-382. 
Hue Hue Tlapallan, 123, 231. 
Hurons (see Wyandots). 
Hut-rings, 294. 

Idols, 106, 107, 223, 384, 385, 422, 444, 451-456. 
Incas, 84, 127, 128, 129. 

Iron, 51, 53, 214, 243, 287, 297, 306, 322, 323, 359, 372-380. 
Iroquois, 80, 235, 272, 294, 433. 
Ishmael, 52. 
Itzaob, 367. 

Jaredites, 48-52, 139, 218, 219, 223, 235, 261, 326, 372, 380, 
389, etc. 

Jehovah, supposed worship of, 186, 243, 475. 
Kiowas, 81, 434. 

Knowledge, archaeological, in 1830, 113, 130, 138. 
Kukulkan (also Cukulkan), 242, 367, 394. 
Lamanites, 46, 53. 140, 308, etc. 
Land-bridge, 75. 

Language, origin of, 462 ; classification of, 463. 

Languages, American, origin of, 481; diversity of, 72, 487- 
491; structure of, 72, 213, 324, 343, 359, 463, 483; number of, 71, 
78, 189, 463, 483-487 ; supposed resemblance to Hebrew, 189, 466- 
477 ; supposed resemblance to Chinese and other tongues, 343, 
477-481 ; not wrecks of more developed tongues, 481. 

Madisonville, O., cemetery at, 168. 

Man, unity of, 62, 63. 

Manco Capac, 111, 128. 

Mandans, 144, 305. 

Manti, 495. 

Manuscripts (or codices), 506. 
Maroni River, 497. 
Mastodon, 70, 76, 281. 

Mayas, 81, 1 19-122, 216, 224, 239, 425, 431, 441, etc. 
Menominees, 144. 



585 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



Migrations of Indian tribes, 271, 326; of Jaredites, 48-52, 
243; of Nephites, 52-55, 244, 264; of Mexicans, 71, 122, 123, 217, 
225-235; of Mayas, 217, 225-235; of Mound Builders, 268-274. 

Miocene, flora of, 77. 

Miztecs, 81, 126, 433. 

Mokis, 146, 162, 233. 

Monotheism of Peru and Tezcuco, 322, 399. 
Moron, a city in Argentine Republic, 499. 
Moroni, 18, 55, 497. 

Mortar (or cement), 18, 95, 96, 246, 296, 323, 337. 
Mosaics at Mitla, 100. 

Mounds, altar, 87; burial, 89, 282, 314, 318; effigy, 90, 267, 
281, 283, 320, 461; of observation, 90; temple, 88; implements in, 
285, 288, 289, 298, 374 ; supposed geometrical exactness of, 291 ; 
number of, 85. 

Mound Builders, unity of, 265-268; migrations of, 268-274, 
115-119; antiquity of, 274-286, 363, 369, 371; culture of, 247, 286- 
307, 340; nationality of, 115, 169, 256-265, 308, 319. 

Mulek, 54, 498. 

Mummies, 109, 155-160, 324, 354~356. 
Muyscas, 82, 107, 350. 
Mythology, 436. 
Nachan, 120. 

Nahuas, 81, 122-126 (see Aztecs and Toltecs). 
Natchez, 422, 460, 479. 
Natchez bone, 68. 
Necromancy, 187, 419. 
Neophites, 494. 

Nephites, 46, 53, 139, 218, 223, 235, 250, 262, 326, 372, 380, 382, 
389, etc. 

New Orleans skeleton, 69. 
New York, antiquities of, 313. 
Nomenclature, American, 491. 
Olmecs, 226, 228. 
Ornamentation, Indian, 203, 358. 
Orinoco, stocks of the, 82, 144. 
Otomies, 81, 479. 
Pacific Coast, stocks of the, 79. 
Peace towns, 199, 211. 
Phallic worship, 197, 460. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



587 



Pictographs, 505, 509, 510, 519. 

Pipes, Mound Builder, 269, 298, 299, 312. 

Plates, Mormon, 18-25, 55, 524; Kinderhook, 138, 545; Men- 
don, 563. 

Plummet, Americans ignorant of, 214, 360. 

Polytheism, 213, 385, 386, 396-399- 

Popul Vuh, 237, 506. 

Pottery, 108, 295, 298, 299-307, 323. 

Priests, 53, 191, 417-419. 

Pueblos, 91, 146, 160, 258, 266, 369. 

Purification and preparatory ceremonies, 204. 

Quetzalcoatl, 136, 148, 153, 367, 404-411, 419, 429, 450, 458. 

Quiches, 81, 122, 126, 237, 327, 335, 342, 432, 441. 

Quichuas (Kechuas), 84, 145, 332, 365. 

Quipos, 323, 509. 

Ramah, Hill, 51, 55. 

Ruins, of Cliff Dwellers, 91-95; Las Casas Grandes, 95, 229; 
Quemada, 95, 229; Tula, 96; Teotihuacan, 96, 113, 443; Cholula, 
99, 113, 148, 443; Mitla, 99, 113, 132; Palenque, 100, 113, 120, 132, 
365, 370, 433; Uxmal, 102, 365; Chichen Itza, 103, 113, 365; Tikal, 
104; Copan, 50, 106, 113, 121, 132, 223, 366, 443; Quirigua, 50, 
105, 217, 223, 538; Sogomuxi, 108; Gran Chimu, 109, 364; 
Pachacamac, no, 443; Cuzco, 53, no, 127; Tiaghuanaco, 112, 
365, 371, 444; Titicaca, in; miscellaneous, 107. 

Sacrifices, human, 359, 419, 457, 461. 

Sacred number, American, 322, 384. 

Sami, 498. 

Sanctum Sanctorum, 194, 207. 
Scriptures, quoted by Mormons, 178, 179, 522. 
Sculpture work, 96, 108, 112, 127, 222, 246, 247, 270, 353, 364, 
457- 

Sedentary habits of American Indians, 392-305. 

Ships, 49, 52, 73, 324, 364. 

Shoshoneans, 81, 227. 

Skeletons, decay of, 280. 

Sonorans, 81, 227. 

Spaulding's Romances, 25-47. 

Stocks, location of, 78-85. 

Surgery, Mound Builders ignorant of, 306; Peruvian, 376 



588 



CUMORAH RE J" 1 SIT 'ED 



Tablets, Davenport, 557; Grave Creek, 541: Newark, 138, 214. 
55i. 

Tallegwi (also AlligewH, 116-119, 135. 258, 282, 316. 
Tapuyas. 60. 83. 

Temples, Xephite, 53, 56, 295, 336, 444; Mayan, 100-107. 246, 
338, 370. -143. _|47. 448. 450: Mexican, 96, 99. 338, 369, 384, 443. 
447, 449 : Mound Builder, 446, 448 ; Muyscan. 108 ; Peruvian, 
110-112, 371, 384. 407. 

Terraces, river. 277. 

Testimony of, citizens of Palmyra. 15; Joseph Miller, 28, 45 ; 
Mrs. Eichbaum, 30 ; Dr. Winter, 31 ; Mrs. Dunlap, 32 ; Walter 
Scott, 32 ; Alexander Campbell, 32 ; Darwin Atwater, 33 ; Dr. 
Rosa, 34 : Zebulon Rudolph, 35 ; Pomeroy Tucker, 35 ; Abel 
Chase. 36: J. H. Gilbert. 36; John Spaulding, 38: Martha Spauld- 
ing. 38 ; Henry Lake, 39 : John X. Miller. 40 : Aaron Wright. 
41 ; Oliver Smith. 42 ; Xahum Howard. 43 : Artemus Cunning- 
ham. 43 : of Three Witnesses, 23 ; of Eight Witnesses, 24 ; 
Redick McKee, 45 : Abner Jackson, 46. 

Textile fabrics, 243, 301. 323. 

Theocracy, supposed notions of. 187. 

Time, reckoning of. 190. 324. 358. 

Tlaloc, 418, 430. 441. 458. 459- 

Toltecs, 81. 115, 123-126. 153. 217. 224. 227, 231. 234, 235. 
250-254. 258, 327. 335- etc. 

Traditions, of a northern origin. 71 : of a deluge. 327-336, 
387; of creation, 359, 428-436: of white and bearded men, 148- 
155; of a sacred book, 136, 437 ; of mound building. 281-283. 

Translation of plates, manner of. 22. 

Trephining, 376. 

Trinity, the Mayan, 389. 401. 

Tupis, 82, 422. 

Tutul Xiu, 368. 

Urim and Thummim, 18, 19, 22, 192. 
Uto-Aztecan stock, 81. 227. 

Vanished races, theory of, 115. 136, 239, 256, 520. 

Viracocha, 148, 150. 

Visions of Joseph Smith. 17. 18. 

Votan. 120, 148. 149. 3^7. 335- 

Walam Olum. the. 115. 317. 

Wheat, not found in America. 382. 



CUMORAH REVISITED 



589 



Wixeepecocha, 148, 149. 

Women, separation of, 199, 211, 358. 

Worship, animal, 359, 386, 393, 461 ; hero, 387 ; sky, 359, 386, 
395, 445, 460; spirit, 384, 386; fetich, 385, 386. 

Writing, "Reformed Egyptian," 19, 53, 340, 348, 465, 501, 503, 
508; Hebrew, 465, 551; Maya, 62, 323, 346, 506, 512, 515; Mexi- 
can, 62, 323, 346, 511; Iconomatic, 516, 517; indigenous, 517; 
"Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyriac and Arabic," 503, 504, 518, 521, 
526, 527, 528, 529, 530, 532, 533, 535- 

Wyandots, 184, 283. 

Xibalba, supposed name of ancient empire, 71, 119, 122, 233, 
237, 251, 441. 

Xicalancas, 226, 228. 
Yumas, 60, 80. 
Yuncas, 84, 364. 
Yurucares, 144. 

Zamna (also Itzamna), 148, 150, 367, 459, 519, 520. 
Zapotecs, 81, 99, 126, 223, 423. 
Zunis, 146, 233. 



"The True Origin of 
Mormon Polygamy " 



By 

Charles A. Shoo/z 



\ PRESENTATION of the 

evidences connecting Joseph 
Smith with the doctrine 
and practice of polygamy. 



Published by the 

Trice, 50 cents 



"The Sword 
of Laban 



^^pHE organ of the American 

Anti-Mormon Association. 
Published monthly at Pikeville, 
Ky.y by the editor, R. B. Neal. 



Price, $1.00 per year 



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